Grosse Pointe Buff
by TalesOfSpike
Summary: COMPLETE It's another one of those film rewrites. This time Spike's the guy who disappeared, leaving Buffy sitting waiting in her prom dress. Based on Grosse Pointe Blank. Chapter 9 to 17 new to ff.net
1. Chapter 1

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Grosse Pointe Buff

By TalesOfSpike

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood Pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping the owners of them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review. 

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Feedback: Please, please, please. I'm kind of struggling to get myself started on the second chapter, so reviews would no doubt help me get my ass in gear. (Sandy.Osborne@blueyonder.co.uk)

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Rating: PG-13 for now basically for language. May go up, I haven't decided. 

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Chapter 1

The young man watched round the edge of his open hotel room window, looking out at the elegant high rise opposite. He had an individual style, but he adapted his look to fit in wherever his career took him. Today, since he was in a four star hotel on New York's Upper East Side , his old leather duster was packed away in his suitcase in the trunk of his hire car. He wore a high-end black suit with a black shirt and tie. His hair was bleached to a startling white-blonde, which had it been natural should have been accompanied by pink irises. Instead his eyes were blue, varying with his mood from the grey-tinted shade of a stormy ocean to the deepest ultramarine.

He used a headset attached to his cell-phone to speak to his secretary while he rinsed said eyes with a saline solution using an eye-bath. "The shipment's arrived? One thousand rounds .357 magnum, steelcore. One thousand rounds .380, soft points. Okay, authorise the funds transfer from account 2795683 to account 76-845-69469-33484."

"Got it."

The man paced impatiently to his left, glancing out of the corner window, which afforded him a view for several blocks down the street. A movement out of synch with the general flow of the traffic attracted his attention. He picked up the rifle that sat ready-assembled on a chair set back from the window, looking through the attached scope. A few blocks down a bicycle messenger wove through the slow moving cars, with a large black shoulder bag slung across his body to rest against his hip. As he moved, his hand was hidden within the bag.

"You know, Spike," his secretary baited him, "there was a very interesting letter in the mail this morning."

"Spit it out, Cordy. Somethin's obviously got you pissin' your knickers." Spike continued to watch the messenger as he came nearer to his position. On the opposite side of the road a doorman dressed in a double-breasted coat with gold epaulettes and braid held open the door for the man Spike had been expecting, and his four bodyguards. Spike, however, kept his eye trained on the messenger as he came ever closer.

"Dear Sunnydale High Alumni,

Would you believe your tenth anniversary reunion has come round so fast? Or maybe High School seems a century ago? Some of the class of '90 have definitely moved on to bigger and brighter things. Anya Jenkins is now a partner at one of the most prestigious firms on Wall Street. Aura Buckingham is working as a model and has been featured in several major fashion magazines and TV advertising campaigns—."

"Yeah. For incontinence pads." Spike put on a girlish voice (for him). "Incontinence isn't just something that happens to older people. Lots of women our age have problems too." 

"Looking at yearbooks and old photographs brings back lots of memories, some good, some bad. Whenever news of you filters back, the school is excited and proud of your accomplishments."

"Hold on."

Sighting once more on the messenger he tracked his movement using the rifle, leading slightly, watching first through the leftmost window, following smoothly through as the cyclist was obscured from sight by the wall. When the messenger came back into view his hand was no longer hidden in the satchel. The businessman's bodyguards had just noticed the submachine gun in his hand, and were drawing their guns looking this way and that in panic as the cyclist's chest exploded from the impact of the bullet from Spike's silenced rifle. Before the effects of Spike's shot had fully registered a dozen shots from four different pistols had also impacted into the cyclist's chest and the businessman had been pushed to the ground. Still, the messenger's momentum carried him forward until the cycle hit the side of a stationary car at the nearby junction, spilling the lifeless body onto its hood.

"As a graduate of the class of '90, you are someone special. Remember, there's nowhere you can go in life that you didn't learn how to reach at "Sunnydale High

"Bin it, Cordy," Spike continued his conversation as he turned away from the window to dismantle the rifle with practised efficiency, stowing the pieces in their case as he broke it down. 

"I thought it might be good for you… Open some new accounts… Network."

"Don't tease me, princess. You know what I do for a living."

Over his shoulder a scene unfolded. The doorman poked his head around the decorative pillar behind which he had taken shelter. The entrepreneur lay on the ground as three of his bodyguards stood over him, the fourth having moved off to check on the cyclist. Behind them in the shadows the doorman unhooked the last couple of buttons on his coat. Even as Spike clicked the case holding the rifle pieces closed, the doorman pulled out a pair of chromed magnum pistols, alternating hands as he emptied two full loads into the surprised bodyguards and the body mass of the group's central figure. He tossed the empty guns down on top of his corpse. 

Hearing the first shots, Spike positioned himself with his back against the wall next to the central window. He twisted his neck to look down on the scene, for the first time noticing the doorman's face.

"Soddin' great Poof! Cordy, gotta go." Spike's movements accelerated. The remaining items of equipment were slotted quickly into their spaces in his other case, the headset for his phone dropped into his jacket pocket and he headed rapidly for the hotel's side door as police sirens became audible in the distance.

Liam Angelus stepped back through the glass doors into the foyer of the apartment building and from there through to the service exit. As soon as he was out of sight of the street he slipped off the greatcoat to reveal a three-quarter-length leather jacket and black dress pants underneath. By the time he pushed open the door at the back of the building, the distinctive braid-covered coat and its accompanying gloves and hat were inconspicuously stowed in a carrier bag, which he threw into the back seat of his hire car.

~+~

"I just got off the phone with a very unsatisfied customer."

"I don't give a toss, pet. Tell them as far as I'm concerned I was paid for one job, 'n' that was the messenger. I don't do two-for-one specials." Spike was on his cell-phone again, pacing impatiently up and down in front of his vehicle, one hand cradling the instrument to his ear as the other brought the cigarette, which was his stress-relief mechanism, to his mouth for a deep intake of carcinogens every time Cordy spoke. He and his hired black Lincoln town car were clear of the gridlock that was central New York, and he had parked up in an industrial area between there and the airport to take the call.

"They're not happy."

"You think I was overjoyed to see that poker-haired wanker? Why don't you find out what that git was doing there and then maybe we can talk."

"I have that poker-haired wanker on the line for you. Why don't you ask him."

"Patch him through."

"William, me boy, where are ya?" Every now and then Angelus betrayed a hint of the distinctive Irish brogue he'd worked so hard to get rid of, especially when he was being patronising.

"Prague."

"Very nice. I can just imagine you …riding on the trolley cars."

A second almost identical town car appeared from around a corner and pulled up sharply in front of the lay-by where Spike was parked. He threw his half-smoked cigarette down to the ground.

"I thought maybe we could talk," said Angelus as he and Spike eyed each other, cell-phone held to one ear, his other hand poised just under the edge of the leather coat.

"Well, tell you what, why don't you drop me an e-mail or summat?" Spike suggested.

"Nah, I was thinking more one-on-one, mano e mano, you know." Angelus opened the car door, tossed his phone onto the passenger seat and walked toward Spike, one hand still inside his coat as he spoke.

"Cut the crap, Peaches. What d'you want?" Spike laid down his own handset on the car's bonnet, mirroring Angelus's posture.

"Hey, I'm putting together a co-operative, a sort of joint venture for those of us in our rarefied line of work. Avoid embarrassing …overlaps?"

"Like a union?" The blonde gave him a sceptical look.

"I was thinking more like a club. Membership by invitation only. Work less, make more."

"Hey, well, great idea, Peaches. Let me know how you go with that."

"You're saying no?" Angelus apparently made a rapid change of topic. "Remember Peking, that rebellion."

"Yeah, so. Ain't old enough to be senile yet?"

"That loony, General Woo? …You were like a colonel or something in that army, weren't you?"

Spike rubbed a finger over his left eyebrow, a subconscious gesture caused by the reminder about the scar's origin. "Yeah, well he can't have been that loony. Sold you all those surplus tanks, didn't he? An' you shipped them to Alabama or Georgia or somewhere. How much d'you lose on that little deal?"

"Yeah, well, I took a bath on that," Angelus admitted.

"Yeah. That _was_ fun." 

"See, that's what I mean. We could be together again; the old team, spreading death and destruction all round the globe. You know, make the big bucks, kill important people. Like I said, I want to make it like a co-op, everybody gets a share of the pie, according to what they bring to the table."

"'N' since you're organising it all, it's safe to assume you'd be entitled to a bigger share than anybody else. Forget it."

"Look, what with everything that's been happening in the Eastern Bloc an' all, the employers are getting us a lot cheaper, 'cause there's so many of us."

"Yeah. The market's flooded." Spike drawled sarcastically, his eyebrow raised. '_Like anything this po-faced pillock had to say was news. All he was after was a share of everybody else's money._'

"See, that's what we're all lookin' at. Now if we had some sort of consolidated bargaining…"

Spike snorted his disdain.

"Look, boy," argued Angelus. "I don't think you want to take us on. This is real. It's all coming together as we speak."

"So who have you got in your little circus then?"

"Francis Doyle, uh, we got the Host…"

"That the one that slips stuff into people's drinks?"

"Yeah, we've got Charles Gun."

"Axeman."

"We got Fred Burkel."

"The queen of the hotel hits. I thought she'd be too smart to get mixed up with this. You got a great crew."

"Yeah, well, everybody's in."

"Yeah, well, not me. I don't want any part of your dirty little scam."

"Alright, William. Life's full of second chances, and here's yours. You just think about coming back to the fold. You think about coming back 'cause one way or another, boy, I'll get ya." Angelus moved back toward his car, glowering at Spike as he reached behind his back for the door handle.

"Yeah, well, you better bring all of your army with you."

"Yeah? One little shot. You wouldn't even see us."

"Yeah, right. Whatever you say… Nice to see you again." Spike treated him to a faux-bright smile and a glare that would have cut glass."

"Yeah, well, good to see you too, kid." Angelus pulled the car door open. "You like that Pacific North West country? Here it gets kinda misty up that way."

"Can't say as I remember. S'been years since I was up there."

Angelus gave a twisted smile and then turned his back as if to get in the car before emitting a stream of dog noises somewhere between yelps and barks, closely followed by the cry of, "Boom!" as he threw his hands up and wide in imitation of an explosion.

Behind his back Spike flinched at the noise. 

"Catch you." Angelus called a final greeting as he climbed into the car.

"Yeah. Drive safe now," Spike said sarcastically as Angelus threw the car into reverse and screeched tyres as he made a one-eighty before taking off in the direction he'd appeared from.

"Wanker!"

The dust hadn't settled on the road before Spike's cell-phone started ringing again. He swiped it off the hood and pressed the answer button. Cordy's voice came through the headset loud and clear, "So come on back to the old alma mater signed "Sunnydale High School Reunion Committee.""

"Cordy, you can take that letter and shove it right up your arse along with you next colonic and the pink slip I'm about to order you to fill in for yourself if you ever mention one word about that bloody reunion ever again."

"Don't hang up. Wait! Did you read yesterday's offer?" interrupted Cordy trying to get her message out at ninety words a minute before he did just that.

"Hold on a minute." Spike looked down at the car's fax machine, pulling off a full colour fax with a picture of a sailboat on it.

Cordy continued on excitedly as she heard him tear it from the machine. "It's a Greenpeace boat. It'd be so easy."

"Bollocks off," retorted Spike. "I have scruples… You know I won't work for the French." Spike fished in his pocket pulling out his pack of cigarettes and a Zippo lighter. He lit up and inhaled sharply before he continued.

"Listen, pet is everything all set up for Miami?"

"Well, duh. What do you think you pay me for?"

"Fine, fine, okay."

"Spike, are you alright? You don't really seem like yourself lately. Is it the job? Are you gonna have to quit, 'cause I haven't exactly been ploughing funds into my pension plan, if you know what I mean? Is it getting to you? I mean ten year reunion, that means life's kinda slipping by."

"Are you talking about realising I'm not going to live forever or about being afraid of dying?"

"I kinda hadn't looked at it like that."

"Then why are you so interested in me going to my high school reunion?"

"I just think it's funny that you have one. I sort of imagined you being boxed up and shipped over here in a packing case, with a big sign on the side saying do not open except in case of emergency. Kinda like a real life GI Joe ninja doll."

Spike sighed. "My grandmother died when I was fourteen. After that, mum had no family left in England so we moved out to California to be near my dad's folks. Okay? Does that satisfy your overdeveloped curiosity?"

"Sure."

"By-ye."

~+~

Spike sat cross-legged on the floor of his Miami hotel room. The only light on his sculpted features was the harsh blue and pink of the neon tubes outside. He wasn't meditating or anything. Yoga wasn't his thing. In front of him there was a hole in the floor. Two planks were lain lengthways over the hole with a gap in the middle. Below the hole which he'd made was a ceiling vent leading to the room below. Below the vent was a double bed in which a stocky middle aged man lay on his back sleeping.

Spike's gloved hands lowered a fibre optic cable with a miniature low-light video camera down through the vent grating into the lower room and he checked his target was in position as anticipated. Then he turned his attention to the equipment that rested on top of the planks. A tripod supported a strange looking set up. Spike fed out some thick black thread from a reel, so that the end of the thread dangled mere inches above the open mouth of the sleeping man. Once this was in place Spike turned the tap at the base of a syringe positioned over the thread and pressed down on the syringe's plunger. 

The viscous blue liquid in the syringe dripped silently onto the thread as he maintained a constant pressure. He traced the progress of the liquid not wanting to cause the man to ingest more than necessary, lest it show up in the pathology report. It took less than a minute for the liquid to drain down the end of the thread. Unfortunately, mere seconds before the first drop fell, the man twisted in his sleep. His head shifted a fraction and the first drop, which by this time Spike could do nothing to stop landed half an inch to the right of the man's mouth, startling him into consciousness. 

"Oh fuck," muttered Spike rapidly pulling camera and string back up into his own room. He unholstered a silenced pistol and ran for the stairs. Before the other man had woken up enough to do more than reach for his own weapon from the bedside cabinet Spike had kicked in his room door and the recoil from Spike's first shot hitting him square in the chest drove him back onto the bed.

He still managed to speak, despite his pain and terror. "Whatever it is that I'm doing that you don't like, I'll stop doing it."

Spike treated him to a dispassionate smile as he raised his arm to administer the coup de grace. "It's not me."

~+~

Spike pulled up his vintage de Soto at the back of his Chicago office block. Or rather, the block his office was in. It was reminiscent of the one Humphrey Bogart had in the Big Sleep. Filing cabinets rested against the half height wood panelling on one side of the long thin area that he rented. Above the cabinets ribbed glass allowed light through from a central corridor, but offered only a distorted view in. On the opposite side the windows gave a view of the city. 

The area was divided into two unequal sections with more panelling and glass. The area at one end was barely big enough for Cordy's desk and space to walk around it. The other side afforded yards before you came to a single chair, supposedly for clients but no one actually hired him in person. All the arrangements were made anonymously, electronically. At the far end of the office in front of a cream coloured wall was Spike's desk.

Spike came in through the door leading directly to his part of the office, made his way through the permanently open double doors into Cordy's section and greeted her. "Morning, sunshine." 

"Hi."

As soon as she had replied he wandered back toward his own desk, before she could say anything else.

Cordy pressed the button on the intercom, causing a high pitched beep before her voice echoed from the speaker on her employer's desk "Spike, are you ready for your messages?"

"Uh, gimme a second."

He lit up a cigarette and wandered aimlessly around his end of the area, straightening pictures that were already straight before picking up a motorbike magazine and sitting down behind his desk.

Cordy moved in her seat to watch him and when he sat down she picked up a bulky brown envelope and a red wallet wrapped in several layers of cling film, hovering by the connecting doors.

"They're not happy."

"_They're_ not. _I'm_ not bloody happy neither," Spike retorted.

"It was supposed to look like a heart attack. He was supposed to die in his sleep."

"Yeah, well, he _moved_.

His sleep research pattern suggested a deep sleep at that time. There's bugger all to be done about it."

"This is a very valuable client." The brunette tried to make him take it seriously.

"Cordy, if we must do this now at least get your arse in the same room."

The secretary sashayed into the room, coming to a halt a couple of feet from Spike's desk. "We've done a lot of business with them over the years… and they're putting the blame for this on you. They say you've got to make amends."

"When?

"There's someone due to testify in court on Monday morning. The jobs got to be done this weekend."

"Sod off. What do they want, a bloody miracle? There's no way I can set up a job in that sort of time. Tell them I need my normal lead time."

The look on Cordelia's face told him that no amount of bluster was going to change what needed to be done.

"Where?"

"Well, that's the funny thing, I mean welcome to The Twilight Zone, Spikey. It's in So Cal. You can drop in take care of business and then drop by the High School for your reunion."

Spike burst out of his chair as if she'd spilled boiling water in his lap. "I thought I told you to shut the fuck up about that."

"Touchy, touchy! Look, you cockney numbskull, it's out of my hands. The fates want you to go back to Sunnydale, and they want you to make the sanction while you're there."

"So, the client's not going to budge on this."

"Not an inch. I booked you on an early flight for tomorrow morning."

Spike held out his hand toward Cordy. "Dossier… All right. I'm goin' to be callin' you from California. Make sure you pick up the dry-cleaning and feed the cat… Okay?"

"Don't forget your identity." Cordy handed him the brown envelope, heaving a sigh of relief when he left the office, only to be cut short when he opened the door again.

"Luv, can you ring Doc Rosenberg. Tell 'er I'm on my way over."

"Course."

She waited until she was sure he'd gone for good this time to let out an exultant, "yes!"

~+~

Spike sat in a plush armchair in the cosily decorated psychiatrist's office. "So I got this invite to my ten year high school reunion. But, well, I'm in two minds whether I should go or not. I mean what am I going to say to anyone. I mean they're all going to be married with kids and dogs and houses. They're all part of something and they can talk about their jobs. What am I meant to say? I killed the president of Paraguay with a fork, and how have you been? It's going to be a right bloody pisser… Shouldn't you be taking notes or something?"

"William, I'm not taking notes because you're not my patient." The diminutive psychiatrist tried once more to make her point, knowing it would be futile. 

"Oh, don't start all that crap again, pet."

"William, I'm emotionally involved with you."

Spike leered in her direction. "I think I might have noticed, luv." He wiggled an eyebrow at the cute redhead.

"I'm gay. I'm emotionally involved because I'm afraid of you. That's an emotional involvement. It would be unethical if I were to work with you under these conditions. William, you didn't tell me what you did."

"I bloody did."

"You didn't tell me till we had already had four sessions, William. Then I said I didn't want you to keep coming, but every week, same time, there you are. And I'm required by law to report it if you commit or are thinking about committing a crime."

"For one thing, if you keep repeating my name to give some sort of connection, you should know nobody I like actually calls me William any more. It's Spike. An' I know the law, pet, but what's the point of coming here if I can't tell you about the stuff that's bugging me. Besides I know where you live."

"Hey-y-y, that's not very nice. That's a blatant threat. H-How am I meant to function as-as an unbiased professional when you're saying things like that so that I'm left trying to come up with something creative in case you decide to just shoot me? And I don't even want to know where the name Spike comes from."

"Not where you think. It was somebody's warped sense of humour 'cause I was so skinny in high school. An' I wouldn't even think of killing you. I was just kidding."

"Spike, you thought about it or you wouldn't have said it. You kill people all the time. How am I supposed to know you won't kill me? Spike, if you want these sessions to continue, even in their present capacity you are going to have to quit with the threats." The normally quiet, almost elfin doctor seemed to light up like a firecracker. Obviously she could only be pushed so far.

"Look, I just want to work through all this stuff. I read your books The Annihilation of Death, Kill Who? A Warrior's Dilemma. They were on the New York Times Top Twenty best-sellers list. I got the impression you might have a feel for my situation."

"Spike, the books were ghost written. Look, I don't know what I'm meant to say." The doctor pinched at the bridge of her nose as if she were getting a headache.

"What do you say to all your other patients? Ask me how I am or something?"

"How are you, Spike?"

Spike sighed. "I don't know. I'm not real focussed. I'm pissed off a lot. There's been a lot of problems with work and I'm bored and sort of restless."

The woman made another attempt, actually sounding almost perky. "Well, hey. I don't want to make you uncomfortable, but maybe it's remorse for all the people you kill that's making you feel like that. Maybe, deep down you're not happy in your work."

"Screw that, Red. I've been doin' this for years and it's only lately I've been havin' all these problems. If I turn up at your door, the chances are you did something to bring me there. I couldn't give a toss about those people." If anything Spike protested too much, as if he was spouting arguments he no longer really believed.

As if he realised this he changed track. "I don't want to talk about work. It's not like someone's job defines who they are as a person."

The physician hid her sceptical glance behind her hand. "Okay. What do you want to talk about?" she asked.

"I don't know. Should I talk about dreams? You want me to talk about dreams?"

This time it was Dr. Rosenberg who sighed. "If _you_ want to talk about dreams, talk about dreams. It's your dime." 

"I had another dream about Buffy."

"The girl you're obsessed with?"

"I wouldn't call it an obsession," Spike said defensively.

"Ten years worth of dreams about loss and angst centred on the same girl? To me, that sounds like an obsession. Look. Go to this reunion. Go see what these people mean to you. See this girl…"

"Buffy," 'he blonde supplied when the shrink seemed at a loss. 

"Right. See Buffy and - just this one weekend …Don't kill anyone. See what it feels like."

"I'll try."

"Don't try, William. Just don't do it."

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End of Chapter 1

Next chapter: You can never go home again.


	2. Chapter 2

**Grosse Pointe Buff**

By TalesOfSpike

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

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Dedication: For NeverMindDaria, Rosie, Zzickle, Ava, RetroSkater, Belladonna and even fastpilot who should stop reading now because we are talking total AU, no slayer, no supernatural anything. She definitely isn't going to be a wimpy girly girl, but no supernatural ability, no duty, no watcher. Zzickle - yep, whole movie in a loose sort of way, plus flash backs to high school. Retroskater – yes to Giles, yes to Xander and as to the other, read on. And to Bella… soon. 

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Chapter 2 – You can never go home again

Everything he needed for the Sunnydale trip was waiting and ready. His clothes were packed, his weapons cleaned and packed neatly away in their cases. His tickets and ID were safely stowed away in his pocket book. He had everything from toothpaste to a travel hair-dryer. He was just checking his hair one last time in the mirror when he heard the double beep that announced he had e-mail.

He rattled the mouse until the monitor came out of standby mode, reading aloud the words that appeared in blue on the screen. "'Services no longer required for California venture.' _What?_ 'Alternate vendor to service contract at _original_ cost.' What alternate vendor?" Comprehension rapidly dawned on Angelus. "Spike. Ingrate, arrogant son of a bitch! Swiped the damn job out from under me. I was that guy's fuckin' Yoda. Let's see if he's so happy when he comes home and Miss Kitty's nailed to his front door, or maybe just her head in his bed? Maybe sever his spinal chord, kinda appropriate, a knife in the back for the little back-stabber? See how he fancies life in a wheelchair, huh?"

As he spoke to himself he typed a response to the electronic message. "Preparations have begun in good faith. Expenses have been incurred." He hit the 'enter' key and waited for a response.

"Connection is terminated. Status idle," replied the text across the screen.

"Right, you think you're so smart. How much do you think you're going to have to pay once Spikey boy is out of commission?" Angelus picked up the phone and hit a series of buttons from memory.

A bright young female voice came on the line. "Agent Walsh's office. How may I connect your call?"

"Hi." Angelus was suddenly all charm. "Can you put me through to extension 17 please?"

"Graham," answered the voice on the other end.

"Hi, I've got a line on that hostile you were looking for. Flying into Sunnydale tomorrow. He's scheduled to hit a star federal witness before he can testify on Monday morning. Now, if you guys keep an eye on him, as soon as he does his job, you can do yours…"

Angelus hung up the phone with a feeling of satisfaction. Spike gets the witness. The spooks get Spike. Before the client can find out the target's gone, we get in touch to let them know Spike's dead, renegotiate the fee and get money for nothing.

~+~

Spike drove yet another black Lincoln along the freeway from the airport toward what had once been his hometown. Instead of the black suit, he wore a rather more casual outfit. His jeans were black and so tight that if someone were to look closely enough they could probably tell you the dates on the coins in his back pocket. He wore an open-necked deep blue shirt that brought out the colour in his eyes, or it would have done if they hadn't been obscured by the mirror-finish shades he wore. His black leather duster draped around his frame like the old friend it was. A cigarette burned down in his hand as it tapped against the steering wheel. As he drove through the outskirts of town, craning forward in his seat to take in sights at once familiar and unknown, he switched off the punk CD he had been listening to, choosing to sample the local radio network. The song Pretty in Pink took him straight back to junior high and the first time he saw her.

Several hundred yards behind him, two men were bickering with each other as their station wagon followed along behind him. Both men looked as if they would have been at home on a college football team about a decade previously. Graham's hair was that shade that was too light to really be brown and too brown to be blonde. Like Angelus' it was gelled to stick straight up at the front, but thanks to slightly more taste it was only about half the length. He had the kind of open face and straightforward attitude that led most people to trust him instinctively. 

His partner appeared more openly intimidating, looking less at home in his regulation blazer and slacks. Forrest carried with him an air of hostility, as if all mankind was his enemy until proven otherwise. Like many African Americans he shaved his head totally bald, but it was the fact that he seldom smiled that really gave the impression of austerity. 

"Bullshit," Graham gently responded to Forrest's claim. "You always have to know them all."

"I was on a job in Lisbon, 'bout two years ago and I saw him," his partner insisted.

"No, man" Graham shook his head, splitting his attention between the argument, the road and Spike's vehicle. "You didn't. You know what, he hasn't been in Portugal since '86. If you read the file you'd know that." He temporarily freed a hand from the wheel to peel back the cover on the unopened file resting in Forrest's lap. "Why don't you read the file?" he replied somehow still managing to sound cool and even-tempered.

"Bonn, then. I spoke to him in Bonn. Angelus was there. He introduced us." Forrest refused to be outdone.

"Whatever. How about since you two are such bosom buddies, I'll just take the weekend off and you can kill him?"

Spike hummed along, thinking back to the fall of '86 and his first day as part of the American education system, and the temporarily welcoming sight of the diminutive blonde in the tiny mini-skirt sitting on the wall by the school's main entrance. When the DJ came on at the end of the track, his jaw dropped and he reached to turn up the volume.

"Okay, guys. That was The Psychedelic Furs from the days when the brat pack were making movies that didn't go straight to video, and we all thought Andrew McCarthy was going to be the next Steve McQueen. And that goes out to the returning veterans of Sunnydale High class of '90. Here on WFSC, we're going to be celebrating with you guys by making a return to the eighties. All day, every day from now till Monday morning each and every track'll be from the years 1980 through to 1990…"

Spike made his way toward the centre of town, pulling his car into the parking bay at the front of the unit that housed the town's local radio station. The DJ sat in her booth looking out on Sunnydale's main thoroughfare as the Lincoln slid to a halt before her. Spike turned sideways in his seat, using his right hand to obscure the lower half of his face, the mirrored shades hiding his eyes as he watched the girl who haunted his dreams, seeing her in the flesh for the first time in a decade. 

"…And we're continuing with Bon Jovi, going back to the days when his hair looked like he had it done at the local poodle parlour with Wanted Dead or Alive." Her words slowed as she reached the end of her intro, something causing the hairs on the back of her neck to tingle almost like an early warning system as she tried to make out the partially silhouetted figure through the windows of the town car. She couldn't see his eyes. His sculpted cheekbones and full lips were hidden behind his hand. The white-blonde hair, shorter but the same shade it had been ten years ago, the way he held his cigarette, his posture and the dark clothing were still enough for her to be sure. It was him.

"Welcome back, Dalesmen," she said in a sultry tone that sent shivers down his spine, before she had time to reconsider her reaction to him.

Shoving the car into drive, he pulled back out into the midmorning traffic. Spike exhaled a huge breath that he hadn't been aware of holding. '_Damned if she didn't look every bit as good now as she had ten years ago. And damned if he didn't have a soddin' hard on. Three bleedin' words and she had him again already._' His route home took him past the high school and he pulled up at the front of the building, deciding to stretch his legs and have a look at the old place. He was surprised to see a familiar figure heading toward the main entrance.

He called out to her without thinking, surprised and pleased that she was still there. "Miss Calendar! Oi! Miss!"

The elegant, yet casually dressed woman turned, her arms full of papers. "William? William Blank?"

Spike lit a cigarette and pulled off his sunglasses as he closed the distance between them. At about ten years his senior his former teacher still had the same svelte figure and huge thick-lashed eyes that had featured in many a teenage fantasy when he'd studied there. Only an occasional sign of grey at the roots of her dark lustrous hair and a couple of extra laugh lines marked the decade that had passed. 

"William Blank. Your disappearing act was up there with the Lindbergh baby. The teachers all had a pool on where you'd end up. Princeton? Harvard? North Western? Oxford? Cambridge? …And you just went …nowhere? Disappeared without a trace."

"Yeah, well, I decided to go for a career with on the job training. Skip the whole college thing. You're looking good. Probably still have a flock of sixteen year old boys hanging round the computer room pretending to work on their projects."

"Thanks," she gave a short laugh. "I think. You're not so bad yourself in a sort of Goth way. Is that the same coat you had when you were here?"

Spike shrugged and gave a disarming smile. "Ain't broke, don't fix it." The ringing of a bell signalled a rush of activity.

Miss Calendar looked up in the direction of the school building. "They're playing my song. So, where you off to now?"

"I'm just on my way home."

"Oh, _oh. Really?_ Well, I must be going. Young minds to fill." The teacher seemed discomfited and backed toward the building as she spoke.

The sound of a nearby window being thrown open temporarily distracted Spike's attention and the woman slipped away unobserved. A malproportioned head with ears more suited to a chimpanzee emerged from the open window. "Blank! Don't think, just because you've graduated, you can smoke on school grounds! There are laws now about smoking in public places in California." Spike rolled his eyes as he walked back to his car ignoring Snyder's voice in the background. He briefly contemplated doing a service to the current attendees of the school by eliminating the homuncule, but remembered his shrink's advice and merely gave him a two fingered salute instead, not even deigning to turn round and look at him.

Spike pulled the car over in front of the Mueller's house and got out. He got out of the car and engaged the central locking. As he walked around the front of the car and looked up to check for traffic before crossing the street his automatic pilot mechanism suddenly went haywire. He looked back at the Mueller's. '_Yep. That was the house he'd seen for four years whenever he looked out of his bedroom window. There was the window it had cost him a month's allowance to replace after he broke it playing baseball. So, okay, why was there a parking lot where his dad's carefully tended lawn used to be and why was there a bloody supermarket where his mum lived._'

He headed for the across the car park at a jog making his way directly to the counter. There was no-one else other than the cashier in the store. Judging by the binder full of notes that was open by the cash desk, he was a student working to pay his tuition fees. He cast a nervous glance in Spike's direction as the blonde strode purposefully toward him.

"H-hi. C-can I h-help you?" The guy was short, so short that his uniform looked way too long on him as if they hadn't had a size small enough, or they had just given him the one that belonged to the last guy to quit irrespective of their relative stature. Everything about him just screamed 'victim'. Normally, Spike would feel sorry for the guy. Today he was just someone he needed to get information from.

"You better hope so," Spike answered, pausing only to read the unfortunate employee's nametag. "Jonathon. What're you doin' here?"

"Ehm, it's my job?"

"No, dimwit," Spike almost snarled. "What're you doin' _here_?"

"Em, I d-don't—"

"Never mind. Do you have a supervisor or a manager here?" Spike shot rapid-fire questions at the younger man, not giving him time to think between attacks.

"N-not today…" Jonathon stammered out his response.

"But you _do_ have one. Where does he live?"

"Hey. I can't tell you that."

"Where do _you _live?"

"I-I…"

"I-I used to— Bollocks it. No point feedin' you yer arse in a sling for what's bugger 'all to do with you. How long have you worked here?" Jonathon's mouth opened and closed as he tried to prepare an answer for the hyperactive Englishman.

"Em, a couple of months—"

"And yer boss. How long's he been here?"

"I d-don't."

"Right. Fine. Doesn't matter. 'S done, 's done." Spike strode off toward the back of the store, pausing half way down the aisle to pull his cell phone from his pocket.

The teller watched warily as he moved off, wondering if he should hit the panic button. The guy was obviously either on drugs or in need of some. 

Half way across the continent an answer-phone kicked in. "You have reached the office of Dr Willow Rosenberg. There is no-one available to take your call at the moment but if you leave a message the doctor will get back to you as soon as possible."

Spike didn't even wait for the beep. "Red! I know you're the-ere. Pick up." The psychiatrist paused with her hand inches from the phone when she heard Spike's voice, letting him rant on. "My mum's house is gone. I pulled up and instead of our house, there's a soddin' K-Mart. They say you can never go home again, Doc… but I guess you can shop there." 

The redhead waited till the line went dead and then blew a raspberry at the phone. "Just because I have to talk to you in person doesn't mean I have to pick up when you're in California." She gave a self-satisfied nod, proud of not giving in to him and went back to reading her trade journal.

Spike looked up as he finished the call, straight into Forrest's eyes as the government agents observed his movements from their car, but as soon as they knew they'd been spotted he put his foot down driving away.

Spike made his way outside, watching the station wagon disappear round the corner before hitting speed-dial.

"Cordy? … Bollocks to the contract. The clients could flippin' do a Morris dance naked in Times Square and I wouldn't bloody care. Find my mum. Do whatever you have to do, but find my mum."

****

End of Chapter 2

Next chapter: Up to you guys. You can have flashback to the first Spuffy meeting at junior high, but don't be expecting smoochies, or we can have some more "reunion" era bits, or maybe a bit of both. 


	3. Chapter 3

****

Grosse Pointe Buff

By TalesOfSpike

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned byHollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

****

Dedication:For Retroskater, Rosie, Belladonna, Ava and NeverMindDaria. Retroskater – I'm afraid you spoke too soon. Rosie – I hadn't thought about it, but since you asked… NeverMindDaria – glad you liked the bit with Jonathon because he'll be back to be victimised further later.

****

A/N: Flashbacks are in italics.

****

Chapter 3

__

Will frowned as he looked at his reflection in the mirror. The white shirt and black slacks didn't seem right without a tie and a blazer, but they'd do until he sussed out what passed for schoolwear amongst this bunch of colonials. And okay, what with his gran and the transatlantic move, he'd missed a visit to the barber's which wasn't a good thing when you had curls like his to keep under control. Yeah, the wire framed glasses were sort of old fashioned, but better that than those huge bright coloured things that seemed to be in just now.

Sod it. It was as good as he was going to get. Wasn't like he'd exactly set the world on fire at his last school. And by the looks of things it wasn't about to change now. Anyway, the five percent of people who didn't actually think secondary education was one of the many layers of hell were the ones who reached their peak there. English or American, school's just something to be survived …one day at a time, starting today.

"You all ready yet, pet? You're not going to have time for breakfast if you don't hurry?" his mum's voice carried up the stairs.

"Coming!" he called before grabbing his bag and rushing downstairs. He dropped the sports bag in the front hall and darted through to the kitchen, grabbing a slice of toast and a glass of orange juice off the table eating and gulping down the liquid without even sitting down.

"So how's my darling boy, this morning?"

"Fine, mum, but I'd be better if you'd lay off with the 'darling boy's. Dad in his study?"

"Mm-hm," His mother confirmed. "He's been up since six, trying to sort out his lecture notes."

Nabbing a second piece of toast to eat on the way, he stood on tiptoe to kiss his mother quickly on the forehead. At five foot seven, he was only a few inches taller than she was. He just hoped he was due a growth spurt. Dainty and frail was quite the look on his mum, especially since the ebony-haired beauty could almost pass for ten years younger than her thirty-two years. On a teenage boy, it was akin to walking round wearing a huge 'kick me' sign.

"See ya later. I'll ring if I'm goin' t' be late." He slung his bag over his shoulder, paused to stick his head round the door to his father's study and say a brief goodbye and then left for his new institutional torture.

"So, my William, d'you think our boy'll be alright in your nasty American school?" Will's mum put down the cup of black coffee on her husband's desk and moved to the window, so she could watch their son as he made his way down the road.

Strong arms folded around her as her husband's jaw came to rest against her temple. "I survived it. And despite all your English snobbery the American education system isn't as bad as you'd like to make out, Dru. Got me into Oxford, didn't it?"

She turned in his arms, brushing her lips against his. "That was fate. Nothin' to do with your education system. How else were you going to meet your dark princess?" Deep blue eyes laughed knowingly back at her from an older, more confident version of her son's features.

"So it was written in the stars that I was going to get you knocked up at seventeen, so you didn't even finish your freshman year?" William asked.

"It was written in the stars that we would be together. Our Will just gave fate a helping hand, my love. It's not like we weren't careful. It was destiny," Dru replied.

"Well who are we to flout destiny?" William picked up his wife in his arms and carried her back to their bedroom forgetting all about the notes for the courses he was due to start teaching at Sunnydale U the following week.

~+~

__

Will kept an eye open for someone he could ask for directions as he neared the school's main building. He smiled as he noticed the petite blonde perched on the wall near the building's main doors. Her hair hung in golden glossy waves that ended level with her bust-line. It was held back from her face with a pastel pink ribbon whose bow flopped just slightly off-centre and matched the short flouncy skirt she wore. Her white camisole top failed to conceal the delicate straps of her bra. She kicked her tanned legs against the wall and blew perfectly co-ordinated bubbles as she looked off in the distance apparently waiting for someone.

He came up behind her and tapped her on the shoulder. Instantly, the girl was doubled over and coughing. It was only then that Will noticed the headphones that had made her unable to hear his approach. He'd only gone and managed to make her swallow her gum. He was aware of a group of figures jogging toward them, but he ignored them trying to make sure the girl was alright.

"God, pet, I'm sorry. I didn't realise you couldn't hear me coming." He tried to rub her back, comfortingly but found himself pushed out of the way by a guy the best part of a foot taller than him. Everything about the guy screamed clean-cut All-American jock. And, oh look, they came in a two-pack with matching bimbos. The second jock came to stand directly in front of Will.

"I think you've done enough here. Why don't you just move along and stop pestering the lady?"

William refused to be intimidated. "I just wanted to make sure she was alright."

"Buffy doesn't need you to make sure she's alright. That's Riley's job, and it's one he takes kind of seriously so why don't you just get the hell out of here before he decides to do something about you getting her into this state in the first place?"

One of the girls with the group butted in at this point. Her voice whining and slightly nasal. "Percy, why are you even talking to this loser? Hello?"

Will looked round the group and decided he wasn't about to get a chance to either check properly on the girl or make a decent apology. "Alright, mate, can take a hint." He backed away from the group wondering if any of them were natural blondes or if they got a bulk discount on their peroxide. Once he'd reached minimum safe distance, he turned and almost bumped straight into another gum-chewing female.

"Deee-nied," said the tall black-haired boy with her. "Tut, tut, tut. You must be new if you don't know better than to try talking to the Sunnydale Aryans without an invitation."

"Yeah, well, I was under the impression that you yanks had something in your constitution about freedom of speech."

Will couldn't help but be aware of the mischievous glitter in the short brunette girl's eyes, as she looked him up and down appraisingly. "Like the accent," she commented.

He couldn't help an answering smirk as he answered. "'S nothin', pet. Everybody's got one where I come from." Sensing he was on firmer ground with this pair he decided to introduce himself, "Will …Will Blank."

"Xander Harris," answered the taller boy, "and this is my little sister Faith."

"Right, well, I don't suppose either of you could point me in the right direction for the guidance office?" Will asked.

~+~

Spike cringed as he walked through the halls of the local mental hospital. It could have been worse. There were large windows letting in lots of light, but the net curtains covering them were too thick to permit the residents a view of the outside world. The colour scheme ran to cream near the top of the walls, but the bottom five feet was painted with a brown gloss that was easier to clean when the inmates made a mess with whatever bodily fluid happened to be flavour of the day. All in all the place seemed clean enough, but the day room looked like it hadn't seen new furniture in twenty years.

The nurse, who was accompanying him, pointed over towards the far corner of the huge room. "She's over there." Spike walked over toward the figure she indicated, not wanting to believe what his eyes were telling him. There were thick grey streaks in the wild hair and she seemed to be wearing a sort of fleecy dressing gown. As he walked round to face her he noticed the lines beneath her eyes and how the only make-up she wore was some smudged lipstick, whereas she'd always looked perfect, to him at any rate. She had always taken a pride in her appearance, her hair and make-up faultless, her clothes rich and stylish if not conventional. 

"Mum?"

"Will. Sit. Sit." Spike couldn't help but be glad she at least recognised him, even if she was trying to get him to sit in a wheelchair. "They're fun. Go on," she insisted, so he sat.

He looked at her, wondering if this was what he was going to be like at forty-six. "How are you, mum?" 

"I'm fine. They look after me 'cause I'm a princess."

"Yeah? The nurse said you were taking lithium?" Spike tried to assess exactly how far-gone she was, but it was a hopeless task. 

Dru looked over to her right, turning away from Spike's gaze, humming an old tune, that he finally recognised as Wasteland by the Mission. Just as he decided she was off in a world of her own her head whipped back to face him. "I saw your dad last night."

Spike gave her a rueful smile; "I kinda doubt that."

"But I did. He said to keep to the right when I was driving."

"Mum. What happened to the house? What happened to the money I sent you? Dad's royalty cheques?"

His mother twisted a finger in her hair like a small child giving him a coy smile. "Gone," she answered softly.

"Gone where, mum? What happened to it?"

"Stolen." She whispered to him as if confiding a secret. "The pixies stole it so that the fairy queen could have a lovely party, but I was not invited."

Spike sighed. "So what else did dad have to say?"

"He said that you should marry Buffy. She's a keeper." The apparently lucid words caught Spike like a body blow, but Buffy hadn't been his to keep for the last ten years.

"Yeah, well, the old man always did know what he was talking about," he conceded not knowing which of the two of them were crazier, his mum for seeing someone who'd been dead the past three years or him for listening to the message she was passing on.

He was interrupted by the sound of the nurse he'd spoken to earlier clearing her throat. "I have to take your mom back to the ward now. It's time for her medicine."

His mum's face brightened. "This is Nurse Beatty. She's my best friend."

Spike stood up from the wheelchair, watching as the RN helped his mother into it. He walked round one side of the furniture grouping where they had been sitting as the nursed wheeled his mother round the other to reach the main corridor. 

As he stepped out into the corridor, he smiled at his mom as the nurse took her back to her ward. She looked up at him as if seeing him for the first time. "You're a handsome devil," she told him coquettishly. "What's your name?"

~+~

Spike looked at the headstone that showed his father had died three years before, aged forty-seven. He hadn't even found out until two months later. He'd been away on a job. He opened the bottle of single malt he'd found where their kitchen used to be and poured a stiff one for the old man. He couldn't help thinking that his dad was better off where he was. The house was gone along with all the money he'd saved up. His wife was medicated to the gills, talking to dead people and trying to chat up her own son. Said son was a killer for hire. Yeah, dad would have been so proud.

He dropped cap and empty bottle onto the grass and walked away.

~+~

He booked into a local hotel. It was a huge rambling affair that dated back almost to the town's founding, back to when it had once been a popular seaside resort. When he reached his room he pulled the furniture away from the walls a piece at a time until he found what he was looking for. He unscrewed the plate that covered over the disused fireplace and slid the case with the tools of his trade and the red plastic wallet into the gap that was revealed. He replaced the plate and slid the dresser back into place before he flopped back on the bed for the night. The dossier and all the business that went with it would have to wait. He had his own problems to think about.

~+~

Graham and Forrest watched as the Lincoln pulled into a parking space diagonally across from the radio station the next morning. They watched as Spike hesitated, almost getting back in the car twice before he finally crossed the road and pushed his way into the booth where Buffy sat.

If it were possible, he looked even paler than normal and he hovered in the doorway his weight shifting from foot to foot, looking for all the world like the awkward schoolboy he'd once been.

"Hi," he said, his greeting so soft it was almost a whisper.

Buffy sat in her seat stunned into silence until she realised that the current track was almost ended so she flipped the switch that put her on air. "That was Cyndi Lauper and this is Heart with… one of their songs." She set the turntable in motion but not quite sharply enough and the first bar or two played at something less than their intended speed before the equipment righted itself. She took off her headset and Spike was relieved to see the red light that said "ON AIR" wink back out.

"Hi," she replied, the tone of her voice neither hostile, nor welcoming.

For a moment he was struck by the panicked thought that maybe she didn't recognise him. "It's Spike. High School?" He watched as she rose from her seat to stand in front of him.

"I _know_ _who you are_, bleach brain!" Her fist flew out almost too fast to see catching him squarely on the nose as always.

He quickly felt to make sure it didn't need resetting and tried again. "Hi."

"Hi," she replied once more. This time her voice was marginally warmer as she edged a fraction closer to where he stood. Six inches separated them and neither was sure if it was six inches too much or about a state too little. How on earth do you greet the love of your life when you didn't say goodbye and you haven't seen them in ten years? Hug? No. Peck on the cheek? No. Handshake?

"Shake my hand?" Buffy held her hand out, unprepared for the charge that passed through both their bodies at the slightest touch. Afterwards she couldn't say for sure, but she thought, maybe Spike had jerked her toward him. Their lips met and two pairs of hands moved feverishly to re-acquaint themselves with curves and planes that had once been as familiar as the lines of their own bodies. She pushed him back against the glass-panelled door of the booth and he kept his grip on her hips pulling her with him so that his leg parted her own, her crotch rubbing against his thigh. She reached upward, one hand gripping the taut muscles of his upper arm through the leather of the duster the other twining with the soft curls at the back of his neck, forcing his head forward to deepen the kiss. Finally, they had to come up for air. As the fog of hormones cleared from her brain, she punched his nose again on principle, before moving away to the far side of the booth.

Spike resumed his nervous shuffle, this time mirrored by his counterpart at the far side of the room. He looked at his boots suddenly finding the old cracked leather interesting, but unable for long to keep his gaze from her face. "So ten years, huh?" he threw out, as much an observation as a question.

"Ten years …ten years since you stood me up on prom night. Yeah it's been ten years." Her voice steadily got firmer and louder as she continued. "So what you been up to, Spike?"

Spike shrugged. "Based in Chicago. Self-employed. Travel round a lot on business."

"That's it? That's ten years?"

Spike shrugged again and lit up despite her disapproving look. "Pretty much."

Buffy pulled the cigarette from her mouth, squashing it beneath her foot. "I _was_ kinda hoping for some great abduction story. Something that might explain why I ended up sitting on the back porch crying my eyes out over you."

"Well, there's a few stories but …no. Nothin' that really explains…" Spike looked awkward again.

"So. Self-employed. Doing what?" Buffy asked, chin high.

"Professional killer." The words came out so quietly Spike cleared his throat. "I'm a professional killer."

Buffy raised a sceptical eyebrow. "Assassin. Hmm. They have like a trade journal for that? Maybe a union?"

"Funny you should ask… look, pet, your record's nearly done. You're going to have to … whatever. I think maybe I should piss off and leave you to it. I mean, I'm here for the weekend. I'll be back, but for now, I think I should go?" As Buffy hurriedly pulled another record from its sleeve, he made his escape from the room.

"That was Heart with These Dreams from the year I first met the love of my life. The guy who just walked back in here, ten years after he stood me up on prom night and vanished without a trace. Not a phone-call, not a postcard. No explanation whatsoever as to why he left or where he's been. He comes back and he's evasive and he makes jokes about where he's been and what he's doing and then he ups and leaves again. And all those feelings I thought long dead are suddenly back as strong as ever.

__

What am I feeling? Is it pain? Is it hope or is it panic? Is it anger? That's a given. Is it love …or is it indigestion?"

Graham and Forrest listened to Buffy as she filled the dead air by waffling about her deepest feelings while she tried to cue the next song. They watched Spike as he paced back and forth behind a parked SUV, never quite bringing himself to cross back to the far side of the road where his car was parked. 

"I'm going to go with indigestion. What do you think Sunnydale? Do I let this guy back into my life? This man I thought was _the_ one… This man who broke my teenaged heart… This man who's walking right back into the station and into my booth?"

The "ON AIR" light went out once more and the population of Sunnydale finally got to hear the opening bars of The Killing Moon by Echo and the Bunnymen.

****

End of Chapter 3

Next chapter: More flashbacks


	4. Chapter 4

****

Grosse Pointe Buff

By TalesOfSpike

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

****

Note: Sorry to everyone who's been waiting for an update. I got sort of caught up trying to sort out another story, True Colors. (It's not entirely AU so it's not available at the Spuffy archive, but you can find it at The Crypt, along with my other stories or you can read the kiddies' version at fanfiction.net.) Along with Christmas preparations and visiting my parents for a week, not forgetting the fact that hubby's off work and expects me to actually spend some time with him, it's been taking up most of my time for the last month. As long as I keep getting more reviews for this, I'll work on finishing this in preference to doing any more with that from now on so there shouldn't be more than a week at most between updates from now on (I hope). 

Anyway, thanks to all of you who've stuck with me despite the break and especially Jaime who e-mailed me fairly recently to ask if there were going to be any updates and prompted me to get out of the True Colors rut. Of course, I can't forget NeverMindDaria, Retroskater, fastpilot, FloX or Whisper2Ascream either. Thank you for taking time out to review. Belladonna gets a special mention because she not only reviewed, she asked to put the story on her wonderful site. (I don't know anywhere else where you can get Spike/Buffy skins for your Winamp player, not to mention the other artwork and of course the fanfic. Check out www.immortal-sins.com/buffy.) 

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Chapter 4

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1986/87

Despite his best efforts, Will was unable to prevent his gaze from wandering to the corner of the school canteen where Buffy and her friends sat, a fact that didn't go unnoticed by his current female companion.

"Give it up already," Faith protested. "You ain't got what it takes to get with the Midwich babes."

"Midwich Babes?" Spike asked.

"Yeah," Xander explained. "Like that old Sci-Fi film. Village of the Damned. All blonde, too good to be true. Stick with their own kind. No time for others. Otherwise known as Buffy Summers, Anya Jenkins and Harmony Kendall and their wonderful escorts Riley Finn and Percy West—."

"Yeah, yeah. He gets the drift." Faith interrupted. "Doesn't matter. There is no way in hell that Will, here, is going to get it on with one of their bitches."

Deep down Will knew that Faith's protestations were nothing more than the truth. Still, hearing her say it brought some spirit of rebellion alive inside him. "'N' supposin' I wanted to, which considerin' the fact I haven't actually met any of them yet, so I can't really say whether I would …but just supposin' I did, what makes you think I couldn't get one?"

"Okay, where do you want me to start? 

No offence, but whether you actually got the smarts to go with it or not, the image says geek. 

Hey, I wouldn't even go out with you unless you changed the wardrobe, ditched the glasses and did something with that hair." Faith took another sip of her soda before going on.

"You're too short for either Harmony or Anya. The only one of the three that wouldn't be taller than you in a pair of heels is Queen B, and in case you hadn't noticed she's the one with the Teutonic boy-toy on her arm. 

Chances are you ain't going to be dazzling them on the B ball court and you sure don't dress like your daddy's a member of the country club. That only leaves one other entry route and I think, much like big bro here, you probably don't have the guts to take it."

"Oh yeah?" Will responded to the challenge.

"Yeah. The day you manage to pull off the Bad Boy gig'll be the same day X here gets to have sex with a real live woman."

"Hey!" both males protested at once.

Faith's assessment of the situation was to prove far too accurate for Will's comfort, even though he was quick to switch to jeans and T-shirts for schoolwear. In fact, he never even spoke to Buffy that entire year. It didn't stop him sending covert glances her way from time to time, especially when he started to accompany Faith to self-defence classes at the Y only to find Buffy and her younger sister also attending. It didn't stop him writing song lyrics about her, at least that's what he called them. Anybody else would probably have called them poems, considering he didn't have any prospect of them actually being put to music.

As far as friends went, Will found that it was the pair he spoke to that first day that seemed to stick, and as time wore on he got to understand more about why the pair were the way they were and the bond between them. Eventually, it got to where the siblings practically lived at Will's house most weekends, otherwise known as the first couple of days after their father's pay day.

Xander tried to deflect his father's anger with humour. Faith, despite her size, chose to stand up to him head on, hence the self-defence classes. More than once, she gave the drunk a taste of his own medicine, normally resulting in a worse beating in return, but she was too pig-headed to back down. Neither of the pair would countenance getting the authorities involved, refusing to leave their mother alone with the man. Will knew that Xander lived in dread of the day, as she grew older that his father's abuse of his sister might prove more than simply physical.

~+~

__

Summer finally came and quickly went. Will's uncle opened a new club in LA, sort of a sister club to the Bronze, but less mainstream. His mum got talked into playing the part of DJ and promoter at the club on Friday and Saturday nights. Will helped out wherever he could, setting up the equipment for Dru and the bands she booked, and helping clear up at the end of the night. It became the norm for he and his parents to drive to LA on a Friday evening after his dad finished work and stay overnight at a motel, driving back home in the small hours of Sunday morning. Sometimes the Harrises came with them, sometimes they "house-sat" for them while they were away and sometimes when he came home Will was pretty sure Faith had used his bed for more than just sleeping.

Will found himself for the first time with some real cash to spend and with all LA to spend it in. He made new acquaintances, if not friends amongst the Goth and punk kids who turned up at the club when his mum was DJ-ing. That growth spurt he'd been praying for finally happened and though he'd never be tall, he finally hit the marker for average height. It was a few weeks before they were due to return to school that Faith commemorated the changes the summer had wrought by renaming him Spike, slim, hard, tough and with a wit so sharp it was dangerous.

~+~

__

1987/88

The situation amused Faith enormously. She took great delight in watching the furtive glances back and forth across the confines of the Y gym. The best bit was that she reckoned Spike was totally oblivious to the yearnings of the young girl who was so enamoured of him, but then considering his attention was totally focussed in the direction of her elder sister, that wasn't so surprising. Faith racked her brain to remember whether the kid was one year below her in junior high or two. 

It was kinda hard to keep track of things like that these days. Since Spike and Xander had decamped to Sunnydale High, Faith had been blowing off most of her classes. Nevertheless, Faith would bet the kid was only in seventh grade. That made her a good three years younger than Spike's fifteen going on sixteen. 

Back in the locker room Faith watched the younger Summers rush frantically to get changed back into her street clothes, knowing that Spike would be waiting for his friend by the soda machine. Smiling to herself, Faith took a bit longer putting on her make-up than she normally would.

"Buffy, I need some money for a soda."

"We'll be going home in five minutes. Can't you wait till then?"

"Actually, I was going to go to the library to work on my math assignment. So, can I have some money?"

Faith had to give the girl credit. She had his schedule pretty much down. Tuesday nights, class at the Y, followed by meeting Xander for a couple of hours at the library and then down to the Bronze to score some free food and see what bands his Uncle Oz had booked for the week.

"Does mum know you're not coming straight back?"

"Buffy!" the girl half-sighed impatiently. "It's all set up. If you hadn't been so busy simpering to Riley on the phone you would know. Money. Soda. This week sometime."

"How are you getting there and back. You're not walking the streets on your own."

"Who died and made you Hitler mom? Mom said if I rang, her or dad would pick me up."

"He's not our dad."

"He's the only dad I've_ ever had. And if _Hank's_ so great then where's he been for the last ten years?"_

"He writes…"

"To some of us." Dawn gave up on asking and instead plucked Buffy's coin purse from the top of her bag. "I'll be waiting for you at the soda machine when you're finished."

Spike leant against the wall by the vending machine, one leg bent so that the sole of his Doc Marten rested against the wall, head tilted back to emit a plume of smoke into the air. He looked for all the world like James Dean born a couple of decades late. 

A clatter by his feet brought him out of his Buffy-induced daydreams and he looked down to find a mass of books and a crouching girl at his feet. 

"Sorry," the brunette stumbled over the words as he stooped to help her get her things back into order. "Strap broke," she explained pointing toward her faulty book-bag, not mentioning that she had noticed earlier that the strap had almost pulled free of the side of the bag and she had arranged its final failure to occur at just this moment.

"S'alright, pet. No harm done… 'cept to the bag. You goin' to be okay for getting' that lot home? Somebody comin' to pick you and sis up?" Spike weighed up the now unwieldy bag.

Dawn blushed. "Em… Riley's coming for Buffy, but I was going to the library. Mom or dad's meant to pick me up later."

Spike hesitated for a couple of seconds before he made the offer. "Look, kid. If you wait till Faith shows up, we can walk you over there and I'll give you a hand carrying that lot."

"Faith? Is that your girlfriend?"

Spike snorted. "In that she's a girl and a friend? Yeah. I kinda prefer it when my best mate isn't goin' to try to kill me for screwin' around with his little sister, 'n' then there's the fact that she's my second-best mate…"

"But she won't mind if I come with?" the brunette asked.

"Nah, Bitlet. She's cool. She even lets me out without a leash now and again… I'm Spike, by the way."

"I know, I mean …Dawn. I'm Dawn …Summers," she stuttered and blushed in a way that Spike found endearing, finally picking up on the vibe from the younger girl. 

"Dawn Summers!" Buffy's voice echoed down the corridor from the female changing room, closely followed by the blonde herself. She grabbed her sister by the shoulder and yanked her as far away from Spike as she could without leaving the building, which still wasn't far enough to prevent him being able to hear her every word.

"What on earth were you thinking about, talking to that bleach-blond freak?"

"Pot, kettle, black," responded her little sister.

"Yeah, well, I don't look like Billy Idol jnr. I mean he's probably on drugs or …or he's gay or something. The guy is wearing eye-liner, for Pete's sake... and an earring."

"And that automatically results in an inclination toward the same sex. Maybe I better start locking my bedroom door in case you slip in at night and molest me. 

I think he's cool. Just because someone chooses to express their individuality doesn't mean they're some sort of aberrant. He was just helping me because my book-bag broke, and he's walking me to the library and you can't stop me. You're only worried in case Riley sees you talking to a guy that doesn't have a letterman's jacket."

"Dawn. You are not going anywhere with that guy."

"You are not the boss of me, Buffy, and if you try to stop me going where I want, with who I want, I'll just ring mom at work and tell her you're playing the spoiled little princess and that you've been a totally rude bee-atch to someone you don't even know, just because they dress different from you and then we'll see who gets grounded."

Buffy threw a last parting shot before she stomped off in the direction of the parking lot. "Don't come crying to me when he turns out to be an axe-murderer, then."

Dawn hung her head as she made her way back toward Spike. "I'm really sorry 'bout that. She's not that bad really. It's just she can be… overprotective, y' know?"

Spike used a hand to tilt Dawn's chin up till she was looking at him and gave her a grin. "Can't say that I do know that much about protective older sisters, seein' as I happen to be an only brat, but I do know it'd be stupid to hold anything she might have said against you. You've got nothin' to be sorry for Bitlet.

An' by the way, you can tell your sister, that in England at least, a bloke wearing an earring only means he's gay if it's in his right ear and apart from coffee and a very occasional beer I'm livin' drug-free these days. As far as the rest goes, I've always reckoned an axe was a pretty inefficient way to go about killing anybody. Too much blood all over you. I'd probably go for a rifle or maybe inject air bubbles into the blood stream, something like that… What d'you reckon, Faith. If you were going to kill someone how would you do it?"

"That's easy. Give my dad enough money that he can stay in a bar twenty-four, seven and let him drink himself to death," the brown-eyed girl replied as she hit the side of the vending machine at just the right spot for a can of root beer to drop out. 

"Hey…" Dawn looked on in admiration. "Can you teach me how to do that?"

Just over two weeks later…

Buffy could not believe it. Riley was due to pick her up for a date and the creature from Generation X was sitting in the living room drinking hot chocolate and chatting to her mum and stepfather about pre-Raphaelite art. The two males were being so English it made her teeth ache, like we didn't have enough butt-pains without importing them. The albino freak had spent longer talking to the parental units than he had tutoring Dawn on her math homework. And what was up with that? Where did someone who wasn't even in the country for seventh grade get off on tutoring seventh grade math? 

~+~

"I don't want you hanging around my house any more!" Buffy almost spat the words out.

"Really? I can't see as how it would make any difference to you—," came Spike's cold reply.

"And what's that meant to mean?" Buffy's eyes sparkled like emeralds, her rage lending fire to their normally limpid depths.

"It means that, it's a good job that I happen to like your little sister enough to make time to help her out when she rings me 'cause she's got a problem with her homework, because if she had to rely on you helping her she'd pretty soon realise that what with the fact the only thing you make time for is hanging out with the in-crowd and dating the captain of the basketball team, you're never there when she needs you and you don't remember what you did in class last week, never mind three years ago."

"What I choose to do with my time is no business of yours. A social retard like you wouldn't understand what's involved in being popular." Buffy eyed him head to toe with a look of disdain. "It's certainly not a concept you would ever have first hand experience with. But, I suppose that's why you have to chase girls my sister's age."

"If there's…" Spike stopped himself before he said anything about being the prey not the hunter. His and Buffy's little spat had attracted quite a crowd now and he didn't want to say anything that might hurt Bit's feelings or embarrass her. "…any truth in that, which there damn well isn't, it would only be because she obviously inherited all her personality traits off your mother, whereas you only got her looks and your temperament obviously comes from the cold bastard who couldn't even stick around to see Bit's second birthday."

"Ew! Is that some creepy way of coming onto me?"

"It's a way of saying that your sister and your mother are wonderful people, neither of whom I'm interested in dating by the way, but you're a vapid, shallow, attention-seeking bitch whose entire life is a sham perpetrated solely for the purpose of being elected queen at whatever formal happens to be next on the list."

Buffy's fist flew out with lightning speed, impacting with Spike's nose.

Spike's stance stiffened, his eyes suddenly looking icily cold. He raised a hand to check and sure enough his finger came away red with blood. "I take it from your physical retaliation that your brain has overheated under the strain of trying to come up with witty repartee, but if you're frustrated, pet, you really should take that up with your boyfriend, 'cause I find the idea of getting in a tussle with you about as appealing as spending the night in a pit full of rattle snakes." It was Spike's turn to let his gaze rake up and down Buffy's body.

Buffy's fist flew out for a second time, only for Spike to grasp it in mid-air and force her arm back to her side, stopping not far short of using enough force to cause bruising.

"Uh-huh, pet. You don't get to do that twice. Three people I happen to like live in your house. The fact you sleep there when you're not busy playing kissy-face with your overgrown status-symbol or waving pom-poms like some institutionalised prostitute who has reach the pinnacle of her academic achievement spelling words out with her arms, is not going to stop me visiting them whenever it happens to be mutually agreeable. Learn to live with it."

Spike turned around sharply and strode off leaving Buffy glaring daggers at his back.

It was only when he and Xander were well clear of the throng that had built up around the argument that Spike asked Xander, "how is it, when I don't even like the bitch, that even fighting with her makes me randy as hell?" 

Xander chuckled softly. "I kinda thought you were protesting too much..."

****

End of Chapter 4

Next chapter: Some Christmas romance, that I originally planned to put in this one and if that doesn't overrun, back to the DJ booth.


	5. Chapter 5

****

Grosse Pointe Buff

By TalesOfSpike

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned byHollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

****

Chapter 5

__

May 1988

The soft tones of Phil Collins singing "Groovy Kind of Love" filled the air in Riley's bedroom.

"So this is some sort of ultimatum. That's what you've been building up to?" Buffy sounded hurt.

"No, Buffy." Riley's face looked as if she had suggested he liked to spend his weekends torturing puppies. "It's just… we'll have been together two years next month. And… well I think we've a spark. I mean I know I want to and I need to know that even if it's not now, you can foresee a point where you will want to too.

I mean… I know it's supposed to be some huge thing for a girl. Thing is, Buffy, when I imagine my first time, I imagine it being with you. If you don't feel the same way about me now… then, I think it's time to face the fact that you probably never will…"

"Riley…" Buffy looked up into his puppy dog eyes. "Come the day, there's no-one else I'd rather be with. Right now, I just don't know when that'll be."

"Buffy, I don't mind waiting. I just want to know that you feel the same way I do, because otherwise I think it would be better for both of us to make a fresh start."

"Riley, you know I love you... Christmas… Give me till Christmas. Okay?" Buffy pulled down her top where Riley's hands had pulled it from her waistband. "I think I should maybe go for now. I'll call you tomorrow morning..."

Buffy picked up her jacket and purse from the floor and made her way homeward. It only occurred to her as she mounted the steps at her own front porch that she hadn't kissed Riley goodbye.

~+~

September / October 1988

Spike drove the classic car into the school parking lot to the smooth accompaniment of the recently stripped and rebuilt engine and the less smooth strains of the Dead Kennedys and "California uber alles". The interior still needed some work to bring it back to its former glory, but a summer of working at the local meat-packing plant had paid for the car, the body work and the engine parts, not to mention the second-hand leather duster that draped his now muscular frame. The interior work would probably have to wait another year. For now, it was time to get back into the academic swing of things. He could have got something newer for the same money and a lot less effort. Even so, Spike preferred it to some newer more generic model.

Xander got out of the passenger side and Faith climbed out of the backseat. Spike went round to the trunk of the car and pulled out a carrier bag, catching Faith by the arm.

"Catch, pet. You left some of your unmentionables when you stopped over at the weekend."

Faith glanced into the bag and then did a double take before stuffing it into the bottom of her book-bag. "They couldn't have waited?"

"Hey, for all I knew they were your favouritest pair ever, kitten." Spike replied in a highly ironic tone that had Xander looking to and fro between his best friend and his sister.

"Hardly," snorted Faith.

Spike raised an eyebrow and gave her his copyrighted smirk, and Xander finally spoke up. "I don't know what's going on here, but you guys are up to something."

"Us?" chorused the conspirators. "Never…"

Xander threw his hands in the air and walked off toward the school building in mock disgust, before turning round. "Are you guys coming or what?" 

~+~

November 1988

Spike spotted the blonde, alone for once, in the mass of humanity traversing the school corridors at the end of the school day. When she drew level, he turned around and fell into step beside her.

"Summers, I need a word."

"Here's one for you then, "Off". You can take your pick from the generally used prefixes as long as the overall expression means, "Go away.""

"Can't do that, pet," he responded. "Not till you tell me Bitlet's alright, at any rate. Neither of you showed up for class on Tuesday night, and I tried ringing the house but there was no answer last night or the night before or the night before that."

Buffy looked decidedly shifty. "It's none of your business."

"Okay, pet. It's none of my business, but you're going to tell me anyway. You can either tell me now. Or I can give you a lift home and you can tell me there. Or I'll wait there until someone else will." 

"Riley's—."

"At practice. D'you think I'm stupid, pet? Now, d'you want a lift or not?"

Buffy rolled her eyes. "I need to get some stuff from my locker."

"Fine, but when we get back to your place we talk."

Buffy tried to spend long enough at her locker to ensure that no-one would see her getting in a car with Spike. That was the last thing she wanted to have to explain to anyone. Okay, second to last.

Spike waited patiently while Buffy transferred books from her locker to her bag and vice versa, and then the pair walked to his car, the last remaining one in the lot apart from those belonging to the various sports teams, in a tense silence. Spike lit up a cigarette as soon as he got in the car and Buffy immediately started to cough in a pointed manner. 

"Oh, for Christ's sake, pet. If it upsets you that much then wind down your bloody window, or is it beyond your capabilities to even work out that this model predates electric windows?"

"I knew that. This model predates the wheel." Buffy was so quick to protest that Spike smirked at her obvious oversight.

"Right, love."

Spike gunned the engine and the car's tape deck started up playing the Clash at full volume until he turned it down low enough to allow for conversation. "So, what's the deal with the disappearing sister and the empty house?"

"Can we just wait until we get back home to do this?"

"As long as you promise not to waltz through the front door and then slam it in my face?"

"Would I do that?" Buffy asked with a sarcastic lilt to her voice.

Spike merely treated her to a pointed glance and Buffy noticed for the first time just how blue his eyes were.

"Okay, I would do that, but you would just be waiting for me when I left the house, so I might as well get it over with." Buffy stumbled over the words and then finished by giving Spike a shy half smile. 

"Right then," Spike pronounced, satisfied.

"How come you never bring the car when you come over to see Dawn?"

"'Cause I only live two blocks over, pet." Spike's voice showed his amusement.

"But…" Buffy's mouth opened and closed in a goldfish-like manner.

"But what?" Spike chuckled. "But that would mean I live in a nice neighbourhood instead of down by the docks or something."

Buffy's mouth stopped moving and she had the good grace to blush. "I guess so. You don't…"

"Act like some upper-class snob with a stick up my arse?" Spike supplied for her. "Not everyone whose parents have money is a poster child for the Young Republicans. Dad earned his money fair and square. He didn't inherit it. He was brought up to believe that if something's worth having it's worth working for and he brought me up the same way."

"I guess I kind of jumped to conclusions," Buffy admitted.

"Yeah, pet, and you still are. Living in a nice house doesn't make me any more or less of a delinquent than if we did stay in some pokey flat down by the docks."

"Aren't we Mr Proletariat?" she asked her voice heavy with sarcasm.

"Five syllables? Someone buy you one of those word a day calendars last Christmas or something?"

"Very funny. Maybe I'm just not as stupid as you think?"

Spike gave her another flash of his ultramarine gaze as he pulled the DeSoto up in front of Buffy's house. "I've never thought you were stupid. Just that your focus has always been on other things." 

Buffy found herself flushing underneath his gaze and the unexpected almost-compliment. She scrambled to get out of the car before Spike could notice her disconcertment, but she was already too late.

Spike followed her as she made her way into the house, dropped her bag, grabbed a couple of tumblers of juice passing one to him and made her way out onto the back porch. Buffy sat herself down on the porch steps, ignoring the patio furniture that sat around. Spike positioned himself at the opposite side of the steps, leaving a healthy gap between them. "So, pet?" he asked.

"It's mom… She's in hospital," Buffy responded.

"Bad?"

"We don't know. They're doing tests."

Spike didn't probe any further, just gave her a sympathetic look and waited for her to elucidate in her own time, if at all.

Seconds stretched toward a minute and Spike placed his glass on the deck and shuffled toward Buffy, his hand brushing against her back, the touch so tentative at first she wondered if it was him or a random breeze. When she didn't shy away, he began to rub comforting circles on her back until she let herself relax against him.

~+~

December 1988

Buffy looked seasonal and seductive in her red, satin, full-length dress, or so Riley thought as he fingered the hotel room key in his tux pocket. Seduction however was the last thing on Buffy's mind, the promise she'd made back in May forgotten totally under the weight of a multitude of problems.

"Buffy?"

"Mm-hmm," the blonde responded in the most non-committal manner possible, realising she was totally unaware of whatever the question was.

Smiling, Riley led her toward the cloakroom. When she realised where she was she looked at her watch. It was only ten o'clock. The dance didn't finish for another two hours. Giles wasn't expecting her home until half past twelve. She tugged on Riley's hand to attract his attention as they stood in the queue, most of whom were putting items in, not taking them back out. "Riley? You got some plan you want to let me in on?"

"Well, I thought you wouldn't want to rush things. If we leave now, it means we've got two hours before you have to be home." Riley whispered under his breath. 

"Got two hours where? What are you talking about?" Buffy asked exasperated.

"You_ know. You said Christmas, and now it is." Riley continued to hiss his words under his breath._

"You wouldn't want to rush things! You really thought that with everything that's going on with mom… You're kidding, right? When I said give me till Christmas, I meant give me till Christmas and we'll talk about it again, not give me till Christmas then climb on. You're acting like you've been granted droit de senior or whatever. Get over yourself." Buffy's voice in contrast to Riley's was getting louder.

"Buffy, we already had this discussion. If you don't want to stand by what you said before, then maybe it is time we called it quits."

"Fine by me." Buffy pulled the class ring from her left hand and stuffed it into Riley's palm. Deciding that even in December she didn't really need _a wrap in California Buffy stalked off into the night. _

~+~

"Pet? Are you alright?"

Buffy turned at the familiar voice. "Spike? I didn't know you were there." She looked askance at his black jeans and T-shirt, wondering how he hadn't been obvious amongst all the tuxedos. 

"Tha's 'cause I haven't been there. I've been there." He gestured toward a smaller door that was just far enough ajar for her to tell that it led to the kitchens, his cigarette end glowing brightly in the dark of the alley.

She didn't realise he'd moved closer, until he wiped the tears from her cheek with the ball of his thumb.

"You got a coat, pet?"

"Yes …no, a shawl but Riley's got the cloakroom ticket."

"Don't worry about that. Tell me what it looks like and I'll get it for you," 

"It's dark green, with a red pattern and there's a silver brooch like a star, but they never let you have anything without a ticket unless you wait to the very end and no-one claims it."

Spike just winked and headed past the bouncers like he owned the place. A couple of minutes later he emerged carrying both the shawl and his leather duster. On top of his T-shirt he wore a red button-down shirt.

He slipped the shawl round her shoulders and then held out the duster. "You should put this on as well or you'll catch pneumonia. I tried ringing for a taxi, but they're all booked up and I had a couple of glasses of wine while I was helping out in the kitchen so I can't drive." Normally Buffy would have protested, but it was_ cold and she didn't exactly feel like starting another fight tonight, especially over something so petty._

Just as Spike was helping her into the coat Riley appeared in the club doorway. 

"Well, well, well. It didn't take you long to find yourself a replacement, did it?" he drawled. "Might have known you'd be hanging around."

"It's not like that, but even if it was it wouldn't be any of your business any more," Buffy snapped, her mouth falling open at the end of the sentence as she became aware of Spike's simultaneous argument.

"Coming from someone who was screwin' around behind her back I think you've got a bloody cheek."

Buffy stared at Spike. "He wha'? Who?"

"Yeah, I'd really like to know, too. What exactly are you trying to say …Spike?" The taller teen twisted his mouth in distaste as he spat out the blonde's name and glowered at him.

Spike in turn took a step closer and jutted his chin out in defiance. "I'm saying that if you're going to screw around on your girlfriend, you should make sure you take those nice white cotton Y fronts that your mommy sewed your nametag into when you go. And it wouldn't be a bad idea to know whose house you're in either."

Riley's face finally flushed bright red. "You don't have any proof."

"He doesn't need any proof. The look on your face said it all, Riley. Come on, Spike." Buffy grabbed Spike's arm using him as a support to let her stride off despite her three-and-a-half inch stilettos.

As soon as the pair rounded the corner out of sight of anyone in the alley Buffy sagged against a nearby wall.

"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked.

"Reckoned the girl in question didn't want anyone to know, not to mention the fact that I didn't think you'd believe me," Spike shrugged. 

"I…I… might have done. I don't know…lately, maybe."

"Come on, pet. Best get you home… assuming that's what you want? You could always go back in?" Spike held out his arm so that she could hold onto his elbow for support as they resumed walking.

"And have to look at him all night… no, thank you. I only came in the first place because he laid on the guilt trip about me spending all my time at the hospital and never making any time for him. Then we were barely there an hour and…" Buffy broke off with a blush. She watched the pavement as she walked for half a block and then darted a sideways glance, toward Spike.

"You were joking about him having his name sewn into his underwear, right?"

"An' how would I have known they were his if he hadn't?" Spike treated her to an infectious grin.

He glanced across, as she smiled back at him and he couldn't help thinking she was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. When she smiled her whole face lit up, though it seemed that the look of happiness was quick to fade away.

~+~

They were back on the porch steps. A radio played in the background playing a chart run down. 

"So last Christmas in the old homestead, then?" Spike asked softly.

"Yeah, they're waiting till after the holidays to put up the "For Sale" signs, but… it's pretty much gone."

"I bet Giles has been complaining about the lack of a National Health Service…"

"How did you know?" Buffy asked wryly.

"'Cause round about now I've got an urge to do the same... So how long before they decide that an experimental treatment isn't experimental any more?"

"Longer than mom can afford to wait…"

"And in the meantime the insurance company just washes their hands of the whole thing?" Spike shook his head softly.

"That's right."

"But it gives your mum a better chance, right? And that' s what's really important…"

"Yep."

"So, Riley knew all the stuff you had goin' on and he still…"

"Sort of. He knew mom was in the hospital. I never actually told him the rest."

Spike's head swivelled to look enquiringly at Buffy and she shrugged in response. "You're sort of easier to talk to…"

Silence settled around the pair apart from the quiet music from the radio. "This isn't quite what I had in mind for my one night off hospital duty," Buffy mentioned.

"Yeah, well, maybe I should leave you to it," Spike offered, fidgeting as he rose to his feet.

Buffy quickly rose as well. "I wasn't complaining. In fact, I think things probably turned out for the better." She grasped the elbow of his shirt. "Stay. I was just wishing I'd at least got a dance before I made my exit."

Spike looked down at his feet. 'It's just a dance. Friends dance. You dance with Faith. It doesn't mean anything._' Glancing up, he stumbled through the words. "Well, pet. You've got the music. The deck's pretty flat and I might not have the tux but I've got the requisite arms and legs and I'm here." He held out a hand and as he did the radio beeped out a jingle for "Number one."_

Instead of taking the offered hand, Buffy slipped underneath it her arms wrapping around his waist so that she was held closer against his body than he had ever intended. A melancholy rock ballad provided the backdrop as the pair shuffled in each other's arms. For the first time since she had realised the severity of her mother's illness Buffy felt at peace. As Poison played the final bars she glanced up to see those blue eyes watching her and she was unable to resist covering those soft lips with her own.

At the feel of her lips on his, Spike's heart started beating double time. He had wanted this for so long. His feet froze in place and then he forced himself to pull away.

"Buffy, luv, I can't. Look, it's time I headed home. Say hi to Bit and your mum and Giles for me." Before Buffy could work out what was going on he was gone. 

~+~

Buffy pushed coins into the vending machine and pressed the buttons to make it dispense a stale tuna sandwich. Moving back to make room for her sister, she tried her best to sound casual.

"Dawn. You know Spike pretty well, right?"

"So-so, I suppose," Dawn admitted. "Why the sudden interest?"

"No reason. I'm not interested. Why would I be interested in Spike?"

Dawn gave her a look that said as eloquently as words, 'do you think I'm a total moron?' _"How about the fact you just split up with the guy you've been going out with for more than two years and I haven't seen you crying. And Janice's sister heard Riley telling Harmony and Anya that he caught the two of you necking in the alley. I told her that was rubbish, 'cause like Spike's been seeing some girl up in LA for months now but maybe I'm the one that was talking rubbish."_

"Spike has a girlfriend?" Suddenly his abrupt departure after the Christmas party made far too much sense. He'd just been being friendly and she'd… "Wait. Riley told Ahn and Harm that he caught me and Spike? He's the one that…"

Dawn counted off the questions on her fingers. "Well, duh. He's been going out with some Goth chick he met in LA since about June. Darla, I think. Definitely begins with D anyway. He only sees her at weekends. I think Xander said she's a couple of years older than him.

And like I said Janice's sister said she overheard him, and he's the one that what?"

"It doesn't matter any more. I'd already given him his ring back when I found out anyway." Buffy was reluctant to admit that Riley had slept with someone else, behind her back. Part of her felt guilty that she hadn't been enough for him. Maybe if she'd… he wouldn't have… Even though on a conscious level she knew she was in the right and nothing excused what he'd done, she couldn't silence that little nagging voice. 

~+~

Buffy only went in the end because Giles would have wondered what was wrong otherwise. Even now, she was wondering how soon after midnight she could go home. Harmony had cut her dead when she came in. _Anya _had_ sort of smiled at her, but then the other blonde had dragged her off. Percy hadn't left Riley's side all night, so it was a fair bet he'd swallowed Riley's explanation of events too, or it was all boys together and he just didn't care. So, instead of being at the centre of events Buffy found herself up on the balcony, looking down as everybody else had fun. Including Spike._

Buffy had watched him as he arrived with his girl. She reckoned Xander must have been feeling pretty generous when he called that age difference a couple of years. She would have put it at at least five and maybe as much as ten. Not that you could fault his taste, if you went for that type. Sort of a moonlight and shadow effect. Pale, pale skin and eyes and waves of dark hair reaching almost to her waist. They went straight to a table that was marked as reserved. The man who was already seated there merely gave a brief nod to the pair, though the woman he was with rose to hug the new arrivals, placing a kiss on each of their cheeks. 

Buffy recognised the man as Oz, the club's owner and apparently, according to Dawn, Spike's uncle. The woman he was with looked so much like Spike she had_ to be some sort of blood relation, probably his aunt. Then again, it could be that she and Oz were brother and sister, rather than husband and wife and this was Spike's mom. There were still five empty seats at the table. Maybe she could figure out better who was who after the remaining guests arrived._

The dark-haired woman (Buffy refused to call her a girl) reached over to straighten Spike's shirt collar and though Spike waved her hands away it was in a good-humoured way, not as if he was really irritated by the possessive gesture. She watched as Spike picked up both his and the woman's coat, draping them over one arm, while the woman fumbled in her purse before passing him some money and nodding in the direction of the bar. Spike shook his head, laughing as if she'd suggested something outrageous, but took the money anyway.

Buffy lost sight of him for some time and assumed he'd headed for the cloakroom. When next she saw him he was at the bar and he'd been joined by Xander and Faith. Spike bought a round of drinks and Buffy could tell by the colour-coded cups that three of them were alcoholic. Yeah, she'd been so right. A couple of years, her butt. When Spike returned to the table Xander and Faith went with him. That left three empty seats. 

A soft male voice spoke right by her ear. "Penny for them?" 

~+~

Faith and Xander greeted the others around the table as they sat down. "Hi, Oz. Mrs Osbourne, Mrs Blank. What's happened to your normal escort this evening?"

Spike smirked as he sorted out the drinks order and pulled his mum's change from his back pocket. "Dad drew the short straw. He gets to make the two-hour round trip to pick up gran and grampa, but he shouldn't be too much longer."

"In that case, I shall take full advantage and gain some cool points by dancing with the prettiest woman in the room," Xander held out his hand to Dru.

"Crawler," accused Faith.

"C'mon, pet." Spike caught Faith by the waist before she could sit down. "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em."

Xander bellowed directly into Spike's ear as they danced, trying to make himself heard. "So, no sign of your Miss Midwich then? Told you it was premature you breaking things off with Darla."

Spike shrugged. "Harmony and Anya are over in the far corner with their latest conquests and Finn and Percy are holding court at the bar. No sign of Buffy though. I know she had a ticket but maybe after last week she decided just to go see her mum with Giles and Bitty… And all you said about me chuckin' Darla was could I chuck her in your direction."

This time it was Xander who shrugged.

"Besides," added Spike. "If she doesn't come tonight, it doesn't stop me asking her out next time I see her, now I can do it with a clean conscience."

At the end of the song Dru looped an arm round Spike's waist as they walked back. "She'll come, pet. Who could resist a handsome devil like you?"

Spike pressed a kiss onto her forehead. "Thanks, mum, but I think you're biased."

Buffy jumped, startled by the voice in her ear. Turning her head slightly, she was pleasantly surprised to recognise Scott Hope. Just for a second she'd feared that Riley had found her hiding place, so perhaps her smile of welcome was just a bit brighter than it might otherwise have been and maybe in the warmth of that smile Scott read a message that wasn't really there.

"I don't think they're even worth that_ much, just watchin' everybody."_

"Rumour has it that you and Riley broke up," Scott kept his tone noncommittal.

"That would explain why he's sitting at the bar amidst his adoring female fans and I'm up here."

"Rumour also had it that there was another guy involved," the brunette continued even more cautiously.

"Rumour was mistaken. The only reason I dumped Riley was Riley."

Buffy could almost see the relief flood across his face. "So I wouldn't be treading on anybody's toes if I asked you to dance?" 

Buffy cast another glance down to where the foursome was dancing. "Nope, I guess you wouldn't, but I'm kind of enjoying the peace and quiet for just now. Maybe we could sit this one out."

It was Xander who noticed her first. "Looks like you've got competition, Spike, me boy."

Spike just smirked. "Well, they say all's fair in love and war." After a quick word to the DJ, Spike began to work his way through the crowd on the dance-floor. He was almost level with her, about to cut in, when her lips met those of the boy she was dancing with in a soft caress.

Buffy couldn't believe the look of rage on his face when she looked over. 'What right had he to look angry? He'd been flaunting his girlfriend in her face all night. He'd only been coming to explain why he'd run off the other night. She'd just saved them both the embarrassment. That was all. Wasn't it?'_ She followed his path from the room by the stream of irritated people who were shoved from his way and couldn't help thinking that just possibly she'd read something very, very wrongly. _

"Somehow," came the DJ's voice over the PA system. "I've managed to lose the peroxide pest that made this request, but I'm sure he'll come crawling out of the woodwork soon, 'cause he said it was for a very special young lady."

Confused, Buffy looked over at the reserved table in search of Spike's girlfriend. To her surprise the woman was not only sitting on some other guy's lap, but practically giving him mouth to mouth. It was only when the pair pulled apart that Buffy realised her mistake. There was no way that man could be anyone other than Spike's father. The strains of "Every rose has its thorn" mocked her as she tried to fight her way to the door to see if she could rectify her mistake. 

"Buffy?" Scott called out as she pushed her way through the crowd but she didn't even notice. 

~+~

It was the orange glow of his cigarette that gave him away, and she rushed the half-block toward it. 

"Spike?"

"Piss off, princess. I'm not in the mood for any more of your little games." Spike's voice sounded from the darkness, roughened from the harsh smoke he inhaled more deeply than usual.

"My little games? I'm not the one who did the four-minute mile the other night. You can't blame me if I thought you weren't interested."

"So you moved right on to the next bloke who was. Allow me to be the first to offer my congratulations. Now bugger off back inside like a good little girl or he might find somebody else and you'd have to go looking for number four."

"Dawn told me you were going out with some Goth chick as she put it," Buffy changed to a softer tone of voice, trying not to fuel the fires further.

"Was. Past tense. No longer. Now hilarious as I'm sure you find that, you must have other men to do."

Suddenly Spike found himself pinned against the wall he'd been leaning on, one of Buffy's hands on each shoulder.

"I'm trying to explain. If you can just shut your arrogant mouth for five minutes and listen." Buffy glared up at him to see if he would interrupt. "I was up on the balcony most of the night and I saw you with this woman and you were all arms round her waist and carrying her coat and she was straightening your collar and everything… and I thought."

"You dozy bint! That was me mum."

"Well I realised that! Only not till I saw her with your dad and that wasn't till after you stomped off again."

"So are you trying to say that you were only snoggin' droopy boy in there to make me jealous?"

"That and so I wouldn't have to listen to you explaining that you were already taken," she admitted.

Spike tossed away his half-finished cigarette. "I was seeing someone. I broke it off when I saw her this weekend because after the other night I realised the only person I wanted to be with was you. Now, tell me I'm not as much of a wanker as Harris thinks I am."

Instead of telling him, Buffy let her lips do some silent persuading. It was hours later when the church bells began to ring in the New Year that they decided they should return to the crowded club (after one last New Year kiss, of course).

****

End of Chapter 5

Next chapter: Back to 2000


	6. Chapter 6

****

Grosse Pointe Buff

By TalesOfSpike

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

****

Thanks to: Belladonna (see immortal-sins.com), kmoody, NeverMindDaria, FloX, Ashione, jaime, tuowei, vette, fangfacey, sita, Scoobies112 and Young at Heart, not forgetting MadRog (www.Sunnydale-Tales.com) for her services as beta.

****

Notes: Shortish chapter, but it seemed like a reasonable point to pause and go about all my chores for the day (which will probably include trying to work out how to set up a web-site), so rather than keep you waiting… 

Quite a few people have commented that they prefer the flashbacks to the main story, but I'd be interested to know whether this is the majority opinion or that of a select few. Once I know I can work out how much detail to go into in the respective sections, so whether you want more teen stuff or more twenty-something bits let me know.

****

Chapter 6

Spike recognised the expression on her face the second he walked in the door and wondered what the odds were on him getting away with walking straight back out again.

"Sit!" Buffy pointed at the DJ booth's second seat.

Spike sat. Then he fidgeted, feeling uncomfortably exposed with his back to the booth door and the adjacent viewing window. After a couple of seconds, he turned in his seat to close the blinds on the window behind him.

Buffy glared at him impatiently and rose from her seat to close the blinds on the door. "Since when did you become Captain Para…" She stopped mid-question as she watched Spike abandon his chair in favour of her own which backed onto a solid wall.

"I. Do. Not. Believe. This," she muttered under her breath. Taking the now vacant seat, she prodded a button on the console hard enough to let Spike know she was thinking of prodding something or rather someone else.

"Okay. Let's see. Pick a random date, shall we? Spring 1990."

Spike looked in panic at the illuminated "ON AIR" sign over Buffy's head and mentally cursed himself for putting her between himself at the door. He tried to mouth a silent message to her, "Don't. Do. This." Buffy continued on regardless.

"Two teenagers with the kind of chemistry that few people are privileged to experience in a lifetime and which I have certainly never seen again in the decade since. It's prom night. One last night to party with that old high school crowd before everyone goes their separate ways. That last romantic evening with your honey, a night that should be filled with happy memories that you can treasure forever. Instead the girl sits in her…" Buffy caught Spike's eye, effectively pinning him in place as she paused dramatically. "…Seven hundred dollar prom dress." Spike flinched knowing how scarce money had been for Buffy's family in the wake of her mother's illness. "Boy never shows up, till now. What do you think I want to know?"

Before Spike's brain could take over, the words were out of his mouth. "Next week's winning lottery numbers…Ow!" Given their relative positions, the nose punch had been too awkward, but Buffy could settle for a good shin kick when she had to.

"More like what happened? What made you pick that night of all nights to pull a disappearing act?"

"I don't bloody know," Spike let his frustration at being set up on air come through in his answer. "You want me to make something up? Come up with some piss-poor psychobabble version of events? 'Cause I've had ten years to think about it, an' I still don't have an explanation that's worth a damn. Alright, pet?"

"No, _pet._" Buffy's tone made it clear that his use of the one-time endearment was not appreciated. "It's _not_ alright. It's a long, long way from alright, but if that's all I'm going to get, I'll have to settle for finding out what finally brings you back."

"P—. Buffy, I thought, you know… seein' you, maybe some of the old crowd, coming home except, well, home's sort of not there anymore unless I want to camp in the liquor aisle…"

"The things K Mart will do in the name of free enterprise," Buffy drawled by way of an explanation to her radio audience.

"It was mostly to see you, but it was sort of my shrink that thought I should. It's all her idea really…"

"Why am I not surprised you've got a shrink? Never mind. Rhetorical question… So, your back, about three thousand six hundred and fifty three days late on some sort of therapeutic mission, and you want to make things right between us? Is that about the gist of it?"

Spike shrugged. "Pretty much."

"Okay, so the question now becomes do I co-operate with you in this psychiatrist sponsored quest, or do I kick your limey butt out of here so hard it's still hurting when you land in merry old England?"

Spike had enough sense to keep his mouth shut at this point, waiting to see what her answer would be.

"No deeply personal revelations you want to share with the listening public before we open the lines for this morning's phone-in poll?"

Spike's eyes almost bore straight through her and his jaw clamped so tight that the muscles in his cheek quivered in the way she'd once found adorable. Buffy continued on relentlessly. "Okay people, you know the number. Should a once broken-hearted girl give the guy a second chance at love?"

Picking a phone-line at random, Buffy pressed the button. "Line two. You're on the air."

"Hi, Buffy. It's Carole." Spike envisaged some old woman living alone in a second floor apartment, shuffling back and forward in carpet slippers and american-tan panty-hose that sagged into wrinkles about her ankles. 

"Oh, hi Carole," Buffy greeted the woman as if they had a long acquaintance. 

"I don't think this guy's been open with you. He hasn't told you what happened or where he's been and he hasn't even said he's sorry. I don't think he's got any right to expect anything from you until he lays his cards on the table about the past and about his feelings and his intentions for the future. I don't think you should see him."

"Well, thank you, Carole." Buffy punched another button. "Line four. You're on the air."

"Yo, dude?"

Spike raised his head and Buffy almost recanted when she saw the look of total humiliation on his face. "Yeah?" he enquired in a voice redolent with resignation.

"Heh, heh, Dude, you know, like that chick is so totally freakin' hot? Heh, heh."

"It hadn't escaped my attention," Spike commented tersely, not sure he liked where Beavis was going with this.

"So, like, heh, my question is this, heh, heh, when you were like together, did she put ou—." Buffy violently selected another line.

"Line three. You're on the air."

In the station wagon outside Forrest stopped trying to wrest the phone from Graham's grasp. "Say, William, why don't you come clean? Tell the girl what really brings you to sunny Southern California? Let her know about your little assignment, tough guy?"

Pressing the only remaining blinking button on the console Buffy continued on as Spike scanned the street outside for the source of the call. "Well, so much for the Sunnydale chapter of the Henry Rollins fan club. Line one. You're our last chance for a shred of sanity."

The drawl of the next caller was so pronounced Spike was sure he was either retarded or in a marijuana induced haze. "I've been listening, Buffy, but I don't hear no remorse. I just wouldn't give him another opportunity to hurt you again."

"Well, thank you, caller." Buffy pressed the button to terminate the call and turned her head sideways, looking at Spike through her lashes. "If you love somebody, set them free. If they come back to you, they're probably…" Buffy shrugged apologetically as she enunciated the last word, "broken." 

~+~

Spike crossed the road shoulders hunched, heading back toward his hire car, squinting slightly against the mockingly brilliant sunlight. He reached the car but couldn't bring himself to just get in and leave, not quite yet. A little walk down Main Street and back, that was what he needed, just a little walk in the sun and a chance to regain some perspective. 

"Why the hell couldn't I just have quit while I was still ahead?"

Even with his emotions in turmoil Spike automatically functioned as his training dictated. It was a reflexive action for his eyes to sweep the area. His subconscious processed the continuous stream of information, leaving his higher brain functions free to ponder the final death knell for his long-held romantic-reconciliation fantasy. At least that was the way it worked until his subconscious became aware of an anomaly and pointed out to his conscious mind that the man walking towards him was someone he was familiar with, a familiarity that didn't date from his high school years. 

~+~

Luke forced himself to focus on a point in the distance so that he could avoid locking gazes with Blank without looking shifty. Only as he neared the crosswalk, did he allow his gaze to flick from left to right as if checking for traffic. He, like Blank, was always on alert for the smallest detail out of place with its surroundings. That's why he noticed the two government agents in their stationary station wagon. As he and Forrest made eye contact, both looked away hoping that the other had been unaware of their mutual recognition. 

~+~

Spike saw the brief hesitation in his adversary's eyes and followed his gaze, recognising the men and the car from his visit to the convenience store the previous day. Watching both them and the hulking figure with dirty blond hair as best he could, Spike crossed the side-street, knowing the other man would either be forced to do the same and lose his view of Spike or to expose his interest in the bleach blond.

Whilst Spike pondered the preponderance of professional killers occupying his hometown, he was caught off-guard. There was a slight jink where one shop front stuck out several feet farther than the one behind it, creating a dead zone where someone could lurk unnoticed from Spike's side and window-shop inconspicuously from the viewpoint opposite. 

"Spike? Man." The charcoal-suited brunette reached into his jacket as he called out, causing Spike to whirl round, his hand closing on the grip of his Glock 9mm under his arm. He only relaxed his hold slightly as he realised the other man held, not a gun but a spectacle case into which he was depositing the sunglasses that had obscured his features.

"Spike. It's —." Spike took in the changes first. The hairline had receded an inch or so at the temples, and he'd lost the effortless slenderness of youth, which had once allowed him to gorge himself on a seemingly perpetual flow of snack food without ill-effect. The suit and tie were decidedly out of place, or at least Spike's memories told him that they should have been, but there was no mistaking the man before him.

"Xander. You nearly gave me a bloody heart attack."

"Yeah, well, nice to see _you,_ too." 

****

End of Chapter 6

Next chapter: Back to high school 


	7. Chapter 7

****

Grosse Pointe Buff

By TalesOfSpike

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

****

Chapter 7

The two guys hesitated for just a second before embracing each other in a brief, manly hug.

"Jesus, Xand. Never thought I'd see you in a suit. What the hell happened to ya?" Spike questioned his old friend.

"Shouldn't that be my question? 'N' blame Faith. If she wasn't off swanning round Baja for a week, then I could be doin' my job instead of hers." Xander paused to glance at his watch. "Look, I've got to meet this couple. Walk them round a house. Why not come with and once I've done the business we can catch up?"

~+~

Spike eyed Xander's sleek silver car appraisingly before getting in. "Audi TT. Isn't there supposed to be some sort of horrendous waiting list for these things?"

"'Bout a year. But it was worth it," the brunette confirmed.

"Hell, life's obviously treatin' you right. Didn't think estate agent's made that sort of money round here."

"They don't, but then I'm not an real estate agent. And what about you? That might be the same damn second-hand coat you were wearing in high school, but I'm not so blind I can't recognise a freakin' Rolex on your wrist when I see it."

Spike shrugged self-consciously.

Xander glanced away from the road long enough to look at his friend up and down again as if he was having a hard time convincing himself he was really there. "So I'm guessin' I was wastin' my time checkin' out the airport to make sure you weren't going to show up in a sari, selling flowers?"

"Considered it, but the wages were crap. What the hell have you been up to anyway, robbin' banks?" Spike counted.

"Not quite."

The sports car pulled up outside a high-walled housing development next to a security booth. The security guard waved at Xander and raised the barrier. Spike's attention was caught by the large sign next to the booth. "Welcome to Sunnydale Marina, a Harris Properties development." Spike eyed the surrounding area with renewed interest. On his right were rows of wooden piers with dozens of trim, little sailing boats, on his left condos. The farther into the distance he looked, the bigger the yachts became, and eventually, the condos gave way to progressively larger houses.

Spike tried and failed to reconcile the landscaped vista he was seeing with the near-derelict dockside he remembered. "You own this lot?" he asked aghast.

"Not so much," answered Xander with a grin. "All the smaller units have been sold. There's just the last couple of the bigger properties to go. We built the condos first to get the money in as quick as we could. Even then, me and Faith only own about ten percent between us. The rest of it's all venture capital. Mostly, what we make off one job goes straight back in to buy what we need for the next one, but we're not doin' too bad. Normally, I'm in charge of the construction teams, and Faith takes care of the sales and the admin."

"Bloody hell!" 

~+~

Spike stood by the side of the road while Xander showed the house, breathing in the fresh salty air, between drags on his cigarette. A gentle breeze tried but failed dismally to ruffle his slicked back locks. He wondered what it would be like to live in a five-bedroom, seafront home with it's own private jetty. In his mind, the house wasn't complete without the laughter of blonde kids with hazel eyes running from room to room in pursuit of a dog wet from its swim in the sea.

~+~

"I got a job working construction. Faith dropped out of high school and moved up to LA for about four years." Xander looked vaguely uncomfortable, yet sort of proud at the same time. "You know Faith, right? No qualifications, no nothing, just determination and the balls to do any damn thing she pleases. Went out and made enough money off her own bat to get the pair of us started. Came back to town same month she made playmate of the year with enough money to buy a decent sized plot of land on the edge of town. With that as collateral, we borrowed the money for materials, and we pretty much built the first couple of houses with our own hands, just working evenings and nights. Then, what we made off them, we were able to quit the day jobs, set up as builders' in our own right. Took on some people, did some work for other people, worked on building the next batch and so on.

You been by your old place?" Xander could tell by the change in his friend's expression that he had. "Yeah, well, we built the store. But enough about us… 

Ten years for chrissake. Ten damn years. So where ya been then, Spike? Not to be all grandma, but ya disappear, ya don't phone, ya don't write?" 

Spike shrugged. "Freaked out. Joined the army. They loaned me out to the government. When my five years was up, I went into business for myself. Been doing that ever since."

"But doing what?" Xander asked.

Spike shrugged again. "Same as any soldier's trained to do… I kill people. I mean, okay so it's not like there's a bunch of people in a different colour uniform on the other side of a field. It's a bit more specialised and a bit higher paid, but basically it's the same thing."

Xander looked sideways at him, trying to gauge whether this was one of Spike's well-known stunts. "So you kill people… Anyone I might have heard of?"

~+~

Xander pulled up next to the black Lincoln and Spike climbed out. 

"See you at the 'Better Off Dead' party," his friend called out as he pulled away. Spike pulled the detachable scope that accompanied his rifle from his jacket pocket, and resting his elbows on the roof of the vehicle he pinned Buffy in the cross-hairs. Far from looking as if she were regretting her actions, or even thinking them over, Buffy looked bored. She was looking at something on her desk, tapping along to an unheard song with a pencil.

The lightening of his mood that being with his old friend had caused dissipated in seconds leaving him despondent. With a sigh he pulled out his cell-phone, still watching Buffy as he spoke.

"Trans-Global Shipping. How may we help you?"

"Cordy. It's Spike. I need some data."

"Oh, hi. How'd the job go?"

"It's not done yet."

"So how's it look? You've scoped it out, right? I mean, this is you taking your time and being professional, isn't it?"

"It's fine. Nothin' special."

"Spike! You haven't looked at the damn thing yet, have you? I'm the one who's going to have ring the client and explain why they're still waiting."

"I've looked at it," Spike responded. _'The outside of it.' _"It looks like every other job we've ever had from them." _'Red plastic wallet wrapped in layers of cling film.'_ "It won't be a problem. I have a job to do. I'm going to do it."

"Yeah, right, Spike. And you haven't spent all the time you've been there obsessing over whether you're going to end up in a loony bin before your fifty and stalking your ex?"

Spike returned the scope to his jacket pocket with a guilty look. "Look, Cordy, just shut your trap for a minute. I need to know what's going on here. This place is starting to look like a killers' convention. So far, I've made two Spooks and a Ghoul. So you're goin' to have to check up on what's happening. Seems to me either they've double-booked the job, or someone's out to kill me. Whichever one it is, I'd be kinda interested to know." 

"I'm on it."

"Speak to you later, princess."

"If you're still around. Watch your back."

Spike hung up the phone and gave one last longing gaze toward the DJ booth before climbing into his hire car.

~+~

Spike was mentally calling himself a proper plonker even as he walked back into the store. It was probably some deep psychological need to renew his roots that had brought him back to the site of his former home. Yet, even as he acknowledged it, he knew he would never find it there.

The same clerk was on duty. His three ring binder abandoned in favour of a walkman playing "Ace of Spades" so loud you could hear it at the other end of the store even though it was on his headphones and the video machine where he seemed to be playing some sort of variant on Doom.

Spike strolled to the far end of the store, picking up a packet of gum from one of the stands and shoving a piece in his mouth. Briefly, he contemplated phoning Dr Rosenberg but only until he heard the screech of tyres. His eyes darted toward the door as the big guy he'd noticed earlier on Main Street, came through the door sideways with a sub-machine gun in either hand. Ducking down, Spike drew a nine-millimetre pistol in either hand. 

The resulting gun battle was the sort of thing that made John Woo famous. Packets of crackers exploded into crumbs. The glass fronts on the refrigerated cabinets behind Spike shattered into sticky spider webs as beer and soda leaked out the bottom onto the floor. His opponent crossed the breadth of the store toward him, firing constantly.

Spike responded with the same pattern of alternating shots his one-time mentor had used to kill the businessman in New York, just a couple of short days earlier. His guns swiftly came up empty, and Spike ducked back into cover to reload, the other guy falling silent at the same time. The pair each came back up firing and began to circle the store anti-clockwise this time. All around each of them packaged goods and shop-fittings disintegrated in the hail of bullets. 

And still Motorhead blared through the kid's headphones, and he continued playing his video game, oblivious to the destruction around him. 

Again, both pairs of guns fell silent at the same time, and Spike changed over to his last two clips of ammunition. He crouched with his back to one of the shelf displays, waiting to see if his adversary was out of ammunition or not. When there didn't seem to be a resumption of fire, Spike edged toward the front of the shop, pausing again as he reached the aisle at the front. A screech of tyres sounded from the parking lot, and Spike stood up to look out the shop door. As he did so, he noticed the putty-like block, complete with little curly red and black wires, that circled and baked in the store's microwave oven, inches from his head. His eyes widened in shock, and he made a dash for the door, grabbing at Jonathon's uniform as he sprinted past.

He was ten feet clear of the doorway when he realised that the cashier hadn't followed him. He dashed back in, grabbing the door before it could fully close, this time pushing the smaller man ahead of him as he ran. They were most of the way across the road when the blast picked them up and carried them the rest of the way to the Mueller's front lawn on its far side. As they lay there, a large tree, which had once formed part of the landscaping designed to hide the stores industrial sized dumpsters toppled in slow-motion.

From the shelter of a driveway a few houses down Forrest watched entranced. "Cool."

Pieces of debris crashed to the ground all around them, including a license plate. Jonathon brushed at some of the ash that floated down to settle on his uniform. "What d'you do that for?"he asked Spike with a distinct whine.

Spike shot him an irritated glance. "D'you really think if it was me that did it that I'd have wasted my time getting you out of there when I could just have waited till the place was shut."

He looked the kid up and down. "Are you alright?" 

Jonathon looked at Spike as if he were insane. "No. I'm not alright. I nearly get blown up. I'm going to be a walking bruise tomorrow. I've lost a whole semester worth of notes. They probably won't pay me for the hours I've done this weekend. I'm going to have to find a new job. I was only a hundred points off beating my highest ever score when you pulled me out of there, and that licence plate that just about hit my head used to be attached to my car. So, no, man. I'm not alright.

Spike watched as Jonathon ambled disconsolately toward the centre of town under his own personal, dark cloud. _'So maybe I'm not the only one whose whole life has turned to shit,' _he thought. 

****

End of Chapter 7


	8. Chapter 8

Grosse Pointe Buff by TalesOfSpike ****

Dedication: This chapter is dedicated to nephilim. I don't know if he/she reads this story or not, but if not for them I would have pulled all my stories from ff.net the morning after I received this at best tactless and at worst downright ignorant review.

"Hmmm, I'm quite dissapointed. I was reading this story on spuffyarchives.com, then came here in the hopes that there would be an update closer than TWO FREAKING WEEKS AGO!!!!! So, I have two words for you: Update NOW."

Fan fiction is supposed to be about fun and when I first started writing for ff.net it was. It always has been and is probably always going to be a medium where the majority of readers are silent. The difference is that less than a year ago the majority of people who did review (and there were a lot more of them) were mature fellow writers. With the NC17 ban it seems that the most of those people have abandoned ff.net. Now, apparently the vocal minority are wilfully immature and at best tactless and at worst totally ignorant. The writers don't get paid to put their work out there for people to read. They do it in their "spare" time.

Fortunately, in this case, the two week delay between postings was simply because I have been busy with other projects, so busy that in fact I hadn't and still haven't actually had time to read anything on ff.net. (In fact I've been busy getting my new website off the ground. It's now pretty much up and running at www.he-s-no-angel.net though there are still improvements to be made.) 

Had the delay between chapters been due to any more personal reason, I'm sure I would have found the above review more upsetting, as it was it merely served to make me angry. Reading someone's work doesn't give people the right to take the sort of attitude displayed above. Imagine someone who had been recently bereaved being treated to the above harangue. As a reader, however impatient I may be, I always try to bear in mind that the writers have real lives too. I certainly didn't publish this chapter any quicker because of the above, in fact I made sure it would be updated elsewhere first.

Thanks to nephilim's review I was reminded that most of the people reading this won't review one way or the other. That's a position I want you to think about if you are one of these people, because as long as you remain silent you're letting people like the reviewer above represent you.

Like I said at the start, writing and reading ff is meant to be fun. It's not supposed to give you sleepless nights because you're so mad at what some infantile twerp has to say. Unfortunately, I've realised that the sense of community that once made it fun to write for ff.net no longer exists and to paraphrase the film The Crow, when something isn't fun any more, that's the only reason to stop. So, any new stories I start work on won't be published here. I don't want reviews or e-mails about this. If you enjoy my work enough then you'll be able to find all of it at The Crypt or my own site. If not, then enjoy what's left of this and it's been nice "knowing" you. 

****

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

Chapter 8 

The small figure receded into the distance, leaving Spike alone once more. Once, he would have been quite content in his isolation. Lately it had begun to wear on him. For a few seconds, he contemplated the cell-phone in his pocket before he pulled it free and dialled the once familiar number of the local radio station. 

"WFSC. Bringing you all eighties all weekend. How can we help you?"

"Buffy, it's Spike."

"Well, hello."

"Look, pet. Before... Things, well. I kinda had this plan as to how things might go, an' well that wasn't really..."

Buffy gave a ladylike snort, if such a thing was possible. "Really? It was exactly how I planned it."

"Look, luv. D'you think, maybe, we could meet up, talk about things in private rather than with an audience of thousands?"

"I talk all day, Spike."

"Okay, well maybe I could talk and you could listen," Spike suggested. "What about we meet up for a drink? Assuming you're not on the air twenty-four hours a day every day..."

Buffy sighed, unsure if she wanted to re-open this particular door. "I'm off in half an hour. I suppose you still remember your way to the Bronze?"

"Sure. I could meet you at the station? Walk you over there?"

Buffy gave another sigh. "Whatever..."

Suddenly lighter of step, Spike strolled over to his car, which was still parked in the street across from the inferno that had once been a supermarket, untouched by the mayhem mere yards away. A glance in his rear-view mirror confirmed that the station wagon was following on behind.

~+~

Spike's hand itched to grasp hers, the feeling of being alongside her without touching making him feel somehow incomplete.

"So?"

"What?" Spike stumbled caught unawares.

"So what happened? So where did you go? So why did you leave me like that? So why prom night?" The stream of questions came out more like accusations. "Take your pick... No, don't take your pick. Answer them all. I want to know. I think I have a right to know."

Spike swallowed. "Okay, pet. But what say you, we wait till I at least have some liquor to dull the pain from the broken nose I'll likely end up with?"

Rather than draw attention, Spike paid the cover charge for both of them, even though the small, engraved plaque above the door still proclaimed that his uncle was the establishment's proprietor. 

"So what's your poison then, pet?"

"Gin, double, bitter lemon, tall glass, two cubes of ice."

Spike looked over to the bartender to ensure he'd caught the order and added his own, "and a double Jack straight up." Spike threw a few bills on the bar and jerked his head in the direction of a sofa situated in the corner of the room. "We'll be over there when they're ready, and we'll take an order of spicy chicken wings and one of them bloomin' onion thingies if you still do them."

"Sure, sir. I'll have someone bring them right over."

Spike's hand brushed against her elbow as they made their way over to the corner of the room. Even that inadvertent touch sent a pulse of electricity through his whole body, and if he judged correctly, Buffy's shiver showed it wasn't just his body that remembered how things used to be.

Buffy waited till the drinks arrived, using the time to search the face of the man in front of her for traces of the youth she had once known. "So, Spike. What really happened then?"

Spike to a large swig from the glass in front of him wondering how he could ever explain his actions of a decade ago. "I guess I kinda flipped out. Joined the army."

Buffy's eyes became incredibly larger and rounder. "On prom night? You? How on earth did you... Mr Earring And Eyeliner? You joined the army."

"Yeah, well, it sort of seemed like a good idea at the time."

"Yeah, prom night. You pick prom night to enlist. That's... psychotic."

Spike merely shrugged. "What about you? You got married... That... I mean... That's a pretty big deal."

"People do it all the time. In fact I'd say there are more people our age who've been married than not." Buffy tried to curb her irritation at his all too correct assumption, that she'd married someone she'd loved less than him. How long were you supposed to stay alone?

"So, I mean... If it's not too personal a question? What happened?"

Buffy took a long slow sip of her drink as the answer ran through her brain. 'He wasn't you. He just wasn't you.' She shrugged as she replaced the glass on the tabletop. "I wasn't happy with where I was in my life. I guess I thought getting married was part of what was missing, but then it turned out I didn't end up somewhere better, just somewhere different. But let's get back to this army deal... Do you have any idea what you disappearing like that did to me? How long I spent on this masochistic cycle of self-examination wondering what the hell I did to make you just up and disappear like that?"

"Nothin', pet. It wasn't your fault. None of it was your fault. It was just... It seemed like something I had to do."

"Now, you tell me. Do you know how much you could have saved me on therapy bills if you'd stuck around long enough to tell me that ten years ago?"

"I know it doesn't make any sense, pet."

"You know I kind of made up all these little scenarios, where maybe you'd been kidnapped, or brainwashed or murdered...at least I hoped that was what had happened." Buffy worked on keeping her voice cool. 

Spike smirked. "Sorry to disappoint you, love."

"So, come on just what have you been doing for the last ten years."

Spike shrugged, as if to say there was nothing of note.

"You must have had some sort of worthwhile experience in the last decade."

"Bad experiences."

"Met some people..."

"Bad people," Spike replied. A small smile forced Buffy's lips to curl against her will and was immediately answered by one on Spike's lips.

"You know what you need, Spike. A short, sharp kick to your mental behind."

Spike smiled, and she couldn't help but notice how his eyes positively glowed. "So, well, I was thinkin' what say I pick you up around seven tomorrow night, take you to the reunion."

Buffy, sprayed a mouthful of gin across the table. "You cannot be serious, Mr Blank. You can't seriously be expecting me to go to the reunion with you as my date?"

"I don't see any reason why not?" Spike replied as if it were the most reasonable suggestion in the world.

"Well, I do. Besides I wasn't even going to go. I was just going to make fun of everybody on the radio."

"Really? Well look, say you changed your mind and wanted to go, there's no real reason why we couldn't go together. Come on, pet. Open up, a little forgiveness. Show the world how big a person you can be. I'll even be on time."

Buffy gave him an appraising glance. "Showing up would be a major improvement..." She took another sip of her drink. "I'll think about it."

Spike's smile barely made his mouth turn up at the corners, but it brought a warm glow to his eyes.

"Oh. My. God. It's Pike and Buffy." The slightly nasal voice carried across the room. "It's me Harmony. Are you guys still together? You know you guys were such a cute couple back in high school. Are you back for the reunion? Where have you been the last ten years?"

Buffy smirked. "Yeah, Pike. Where have you been?"

Spike quickly fell into a facetious routine. "Me. I work for Double Meat Palace. I sell Double Meat Medleys all over the deep south."

"You do not," replied the apparently inebriated blonde.

"Would I lie to you?" Spike asked. "Look why don't I leave you two girls to catch up while I go get us all another round of drinks? What d'you fancy?"

Harmony looked Spike up and down as if she found the idea he might be on the menu appealing. "I'll have a bloody Mary, heavy on the Worcester sauce."

Buffy held up her glass. "Same again minus the gin." When he raised his eyebrow, she added, "Still got to drive home."

The two agents busied themselves at the sink when Spike walked into the mens' room. Spike walked over to the mirror checking his hair before he washed his hands. "So, hi guys. The girl down there, she doesn't trust me any more, so basically I'm doing what I can to try to regain her trust." He moved over to the roller towel drying his hands as he continued. "I'm going back downstairs. Going to have one more drink, walk her back to her car. Probably be back at my hotel in about an hour or so. See you there?" Spike casually walked out of the restroom, leaving the two government men non-plussed.

A third man strode briskly from one of the cubicles. "That was him. That was Blank."

Immediately Forrest responded with some attitude of his own. "You think we don't know that. We are well aware of who he is. We been followin' him around for two days now."

Angelus ducked slightly to view his hairstyle in the mirror as he spoke, absently fingering the front strands into a more erect position. "You're following him. Are you gettin' paid by the hour?"

Graham intervened as the voice of reason between the pair. "If we observe the subject in the process of committing an illegal act, only then are we permitted to intervene and terminate him."

"Really?" asked Angelus sarcastically with just the tiniest hint of his old Brogue sneaking into his voice. "Why don't you just kill the little tosser?"

"Because," Graham responded from where he lounged against the wall by the door out, "we are not assassins. We are government operatives." His gaze flicked to the side. "He's coming back." Angelus ducked back into the nearest stall and Graham signalled to Forrest the pair leaving silently as soon as Angelus was out of sight.

A few silent seconds later, Angelus stalked back out of the stall, muttering under his breath. "Smartass bloody wankers."

Spike held the door open for Buffy as they left. "You know, you seem exactly the same." Buffy remarked, crossing her arms across her body in a conscious effort not to take his hand.

"You too, pet."

"How d'you mean? Screwed up?"

"Everybody's screwed up, love. It's just a matter of extent. I got some problems, don't you?"

"Sure," Buffy admitted.

"What do you do about it?"

Buffy shrugged. "I've been to the nutritionist, the herbalist, psychiatrist. You name it. It ends in ist. I've been there."

"Really?" Spike raised an eyebrow. "Any of them work?"

"Can't say yet... But a girl's gotta try."

"Well, say, how about you tell me all your problems," suggested Spike as Buffy came to a stop and turned to lean against her car. "I'll tell you all mine." He moved to close the gap between them to bare inches. "...and maybe we can solve them all ...tonight." Buffy's heart beat ten to the dozen as she shied away from him.

"No..."

Spike straightened up, allowing her to do likewise and still maintain some distance between them. His eyebrow quirked upwards and his head tilted to one side slightly, eliciting memories that pulled at her heartstrings. "No?"

"No," she responded, her voice firmer than her resolve. "Not yet. You've still got a long way to go to rebuild that bridge."

"Well, look, thanks for meeting up and not humiliating me all over again."

"So," asked Buffy, knowing the question gave away too much but unable to help herself just the same. "Is there a Mrs Lucan?"

"Nope. Just me and my cat."

"I always thought you were more of a dog person."

"Yeah, I kinda figured when I stop travelling around so much, I'll get one of them, too. Make it a matching set."

Buffy gave him another curious glance. "Are you happy?"

"Kind of," Spike hedged before looking her up his gaze caught and held hers. "At least, I think I could be happy..." Mentally, he added, 'With you. I could be happy with you.


	9. Chapter 9

Grosse Pointe Buff by TalesOfSpike 

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Pointe Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

Chapter 9 

Feb. 1989

Spike shouldered open the doors that led to the main waiting area, making his way past the people waiting for the ER, or as he and Giles called it, A and E. He struggled with the burdens that he carried, and it was all he could do to make it to the lift without dropping something. Thankfully, someone else was there to ask him which floor he wanted. As he made his way to Joyce's room he fixed a smile on his face. Everyone knew that the odds weren't in favour of Joyce's recovery, but no-one was allowed to be negative when she was around, so they smiled, and they hoped, and on occasion they even prayed. 

Buffy looked up as the door to her mother's room opened. She smiled warmly, as Spike pushed through the door backwards, her eyes widening when she noticed the large bunch of flowers in his hand along with his normal burden of take-away food. 

"What's up, pet? Don't tell me you were that preoccupied you forgot it was Valentine's Day? I'll bet Rupert there's done yer mum proud."

Joyce smiled over in Spike's direction and then back at the older Englishman. "Of course he did. As always," and she was right. Compared with the mounting hospital bills, the money Giles spent on flowers and perfumes, on pretty nightdresses and anything and everything that would bring some small pleasure to the woman he loved, was insignificant. If behind every gift, was the thought that it could be Joyce's last, then no-one would speak the words aloud for fear it would be a curse. And if it should happen that Joyce were to make her way through this time of trouble, then no-one, least of all Giles would care if his bank balance were reduced or non-existent.

Buffy looked from the smile on her mother's face across toward the man who had put it there, her heart clenching slightly at the obvious feelings between them. Giles caught her look and was surprised when Buffy smiled back at him with genuine warmth. "Yes," she said thoughtfully. "He really always does." Her father had been told about her mother's illness, but had yet to check in, even for a progress report. Buffy belatedly realised that she'd been holding onto an idealised image of her father, when the reality fell far short of the man who had taken his place in her mother and Dawn's lives. 

Spike deposited his stack of pizza boxes onto the tray stand by Joyce's bed, and then tossed the bunch of flowers to Buffy. "Catch, pet." Buffy cast around the room before laying the bouquet gently on the windowsill, freeing up her hands for pizza. "So who ordered the pepperoni?"

~+~

Apr 1989

Spike and Buffy sat companionably on the back porch of the new house amidst the plethora of banners, balloons and streamers that proclaimed the "Welcome Home" message. The debris that accompanied a simple family barbecue was scattered around the back yard.

"You sure it's okay?"

Buffy smiled back at him. "Go. She's home. She's settled. She's fine, so I'm fine. But not fine enough to go listen to your music for a night." She screwed up her face in mock disgust.

"You've got the number for the club, if you need anything, haven't you?"

"Spike..." Buffy gave a laugh that was heading toward a giggle. "Go. Get gone. Vamoose." Placing her arms around his neck, she punctuated each exhortation to leave with feather-soft kisses on his forehead, the tip of his nose and, finally, his lips, the last kiss deepening into a lingering farewell lip lock. The blond youth finally pulled himself away, walking backwards toward his car just so he could watch her for those extra few seconds.

"Tell Giles I'll come over in the morning to give him a hand with the clean up," he called out.

"And I thought you were coming to see me..." Buffy teased, her bottom lip gently protruding.

"That, too." Spike couldn't help going back for one more taste of strawberry lip balm. This time, his hands on her hips supported her weight. drawing her against him. His lips nibbled at hers as he carried her down the path, only lowering her to the ground when he found himself backed up against his car. "Do you have any idea how difficult it is to leave you, love?" he ground out in a hoarse whisper.

"Uh-huh," answered Buffy brightly, with an accompanying nod of her head. Then, she lowered her voice to match his serious tone, resting her forehead against his. "About as difficult as it's been getting lately to let you go."

"I love you." The words slipped unbidden from his lips and he froze as he waited for her reaction.

"I love you, too." Buffy's lips met his again, a caress as gentle as a summer breeze. "Now, git, before you end up being so late leaving, that you get yourself into an accident trying to make it to work on time." She slid once again into a teasing tone.

Spike levered himself into the car somewhat cautiously due to his state of arousal. He looked over, to find her watching him, as the engine roared into life. He mouthed the word, "tomorrow," making it a promise, before he drove off into the twilight.


	10. Chapter 10

Grosse Pointe Buff by TalesOfSpike 

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

Chapter 10 

"So, Cordy, what have you got for me?" Spike sat down on the bed, fresh from the shower, wearing nothing but a towel.

"Since it's the middle of the night here, or to be more precise, the early hours of the morning you're lucky I've got anything for you," his secretary replied, squinting at the alarm clock beside her bed as she opened up the laptop that rested on her bedside cabinet.

"C'mon, pet. You know I'll remember come bonus season. Now make with the goodies?"

"Okay, you online? Right, let's see. Your two spooks. We've got one Forrest Gates, ex-college football star from Georgetown, majored in abnormal psychology, and Graham Miller, one time wrestler from North Western, business major. They're down there in your neck of the woods as part of the government's new policy on gun crimes. Their big get "tough on terror" campaign. It's basically a publicity stunt. These guys need to take down someone quick, make the government look good. They needed a patsy, an Oswald. Angelus fed them you."

"So our Irish friend is the one behind all this?"

"Well, duh. Are you saying you're surprised?"

"Not really. No."

"Anyway, they were supposed to catch you in the act, then they get to take you out and be heroes, but they were too late..." Cordy waited for confirmation that didn't come. "They were too late, right? The job's done and you're on a flight out of there tonight. I mean, I know I went on about this reunion thing, but we are talking serious heat, so you're out of there, right?"

"It's not done, yet."

"Spike, this is not good. This is so far from the vicinity of good that on a scale from Mother Theresa to Rasputin, we're talking Saddam Hussein."

"Can you wait long enough to tell me about the ghoul before you get your knickers in a twist?"

"Luke Aurelius. Started out as an amateur with the Basque separatists. Car bombings... kidnapping... a few high-profile hits. Went professional with that cruise-liner for ransom deal a few years back."

"That's where I know that wanker from... but since I don't think he's offended by my politics, you have to figure someone somewhere is paying him to try'n' blow me into chunks that even my dentist wouldn't recognise."

"It's the Oregon thing... with the dog..."

"Jesus bloody Christ on a bike. Is that guy never going to give up?"

Cordy shrugged, the corners of her mouth turning down, and then she realised Spike would be oblivious to the gesture. "That probably depends on how much he has to pay to get someone good enough to get the job done, and since the job in question is you, I'd be hoping that Angelus prices him and his crew out of the bidding..."

"Mmmh," replied Spike, deliberately avoiding telling his secretary that Angelus had threatened to kill him, without any added cash incentive.

"Spike, just lose the spooks, do the job and get the hell out of there before you get hurt."

"I didn't know you cared, princess..."

Cordy snorted. "As if, but if you don't get your ass back, I've only got two days to learn how to forge your signature before payday."

"More like it took you two days to learn to do it, five years ago."

"Hey, it's not like I've abused the privilege. It's been strictly for emergencies."

"The beauty salon?"

"Have you ever tried touch typing with a hangnail?"

"Fortunately, no. I can't say that I have," responded Spike.

"Look, Spike, I am seriously worried about your safety here. Just do the job and get the hell out of there." Cordy countered.

"I've got to go, princess."

"We've all got to go, but we can choose when," Cordelia answered snippily.

Spike answered, as much to himself as to Cordy, as he cut the connection. "Nobody chooses when."

Spike flicked through the profiles that Cordy had e-mailed across to his laptop, making sure he had memorised all the details before he shut down the computer. He double-checked the guns and spare clips that he'd reloaded with ammunition from the case he'd taken from the old fireplace. He absent-mindedly tested the sharpness of a blade that fitted snugly in the top tier of the case, before he closed it up again. He picked up the red, plastic wallet, flipping it between his hands.

~+~

It didn't take much for Spike to throw off the men who had been following him. He had room service send up a bottle of bourbon and made a pretence of drinking half of it, before collapsing on his bed. All of this he did in plain-view of the parked station wagon, with the lights on in his room and the curtains open. When he doused the room light, he wasted no time rolling off the far side of the bed. He pulled on the clothes he had left draped over a nearby chair and a pair of black canvas hightops he preferred to his boots for climbing and was good to go. The men outside in the car never even noticed the chink of light that penetrated from the hall as he exited his room. He moved easily through the walled gardens at the rear of the hotel, finding them deserted, now that the sun had set and darkness fallen. The wall itself presented him with no problems, being far lower than those he had faced in basic training, and minutes after leaving his room, he was retracing familiar shortcuts through Sunnydale's back alleys and side streets.

He stopped some distance away, watching until he was sure his target was in the room he had expected, before he strolled nonchalantly toward the building. He made short work of climbing the tree out front, landing lightly on the porch roof that led up to Buffy's bedroom window. He knocked gently before pushing up the sash window that had been open a few inches when he arrived and taking a seat on the windowsill, resting his back against the side of the frame.

Buffy's smile of welcome was almost a reflexive action. Then, she remembered their years of estrangement and the fact she had a towel on her head and was wearing only a robe. Her brain was incapable of deciding whether the robe's bulk and practicality was a good thing or not. She snatched the towel from her hair and half-hissed at Spike as if she was still seventeen and afraid her parents would hear. "You can't come in."

"Okay, then. I can't come in." Spike stood up and extended his hand through the window toward her. "Maybe, it's time that you came out?"

"Dressed like this? I don't think so... You can come in... but just for a few minutes."

Spike's smile gained a few extra watts, as he sat down once more and swung his legs over the sill. He looked round the room as he straightened up. "Is this still the same wallpaper?"

"Yeah, well, it's not like I've been looking at it for the last ten years, what with going away to college and stuff... My lease ran out a couple of months back, and I'm staying here till I find someplace to buy."

"Really. Y'know I saw a nice place for sale down by the seafront.." Spike answered thinking of the family home Xander had been showing that afternoon.

Buffy smiled over at him. "I take it you ran into Xander, then."

"It's a possibility," Spike admitted before taking a deep breath and continuing. "But, then, I'm kind of thinkin' that you're not ready to be making joint real-estate decisions, yet... So, what d'you say we just settle for, say, making plans for me to pick you up tomorrow."

"I haven't agreed to go with you, yet," Buffy answered. "I said we'd talk about it later."

"And now is later. And you just said you hadn't agreed yet, which implies that you will."

"What makes you so cocky, Bleach-Freak?" Buffy countered before a frown settled on her features. "Wait, you said because I said I hadn't agreed, yet, that I was going to agree, but then you said we weren't ready to buy real-estate together, yet. That's a pretty big assumption there."

"Actually, pet, I didn't say we weren't ready. I said you weren't ready... But, look about the reunion, is seven okay for you?"

"Spike, you don't just get to walk back in here, like the last ten years didn't happen. I have not just been sitting round waiting for you. I have a life and I'm happy, well sort of... and you don't just get to come in here and turn it all upside down. I am not about to reshape my entire existence because William Jefferson Blank decided to finally turn up." Buffy's face flushed with anger as she turned on her former suitor.

"I'm not asking you to change your life. All I'm asking you to do, for now, is go with me to the reunion. And believe me, love, I don't assume that things are how they were ten years ago." All the time he was talking, Spike moved inexorably closer to Buffy. "If I thought I could pick up where I left off, then as soon as I came in I would have done this." Spike's head lowered to claim her mouth. At first his lips were gentle, teasing hers apart with all the expertise born of years of familiarity. As her lips parted, his tongue moved to tease hers, brushing against it with a gentle friction. Finally, he drew back leaving Buffy dazed, her pupils dilated and her breath uneven. "...And after that..." Spike stepped back, putting the temptation to follow up further on his words, out of reach. "...That robe of yours would have lasted about five seconds before it was in a pile on the floor." Spike's eyes held hers, letting her see the depth of his desire matched her own. "I know it's not ten years ago. I just want to... We had something special... and I think the first step to seeing if we still have it, is for you to come, with me, to the reunion."

"Alright, already, Blondie. I'll come. You can pick me up at seven. Okay? Now, go."

Spike, for once, decided not to push his luck. He retreated to the window, pausing as he swung his legs through. "Love, this, tomorrow, it's going to be an important step in our relationship."

"Spike," Buffy half-laughed as she spoke his name, torn between amusement and exasperation. "You... are... a... complete... psycho. You know that right?"

Spike ducked his head underneath the open window as he stood on the porch roof. His voice was so serious that Buffy found it vaguely unsettling. "You know, you really shouldn't rush to judgement on something like that until you have all the facts, pet. ...And, Buffy, you really shouldn't leave your window unlocked like that. There are some bad people round town right now." Buffy made a shooing gesture with her hands and pushed the window closed. She looked up and realised Spike still stood on the roof. He raised an eyebrow and looked down at the lock. Buffy slid the catch closed and mirrored his own raised eyebrow before he finally turned to leave.

Spike climbed as effortlessly down the tree as if it were a ladder. He jumped the last few feet, only to freeze in surprise when someone behind him cleared their throat too noisily for it to be anything other than a bid for his attention.


	11. Chapter 11

Grosse Pointe Buff by TalesOfSpike 

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

Chapter 11 

"It's customary to use the doors. In fact, there's this little button right next to it, that rings a bell to let us know when people come calling." Joyce's voice betrayed her amusement.

"What can I say? Old habits die hard." Spike turned to face his companion, treating her to a broad smile. 

"That would mean that you still have a sweet tooth for hot chocolate." 

"You always did know my weaknesses, Joyce."

"Mostly, because you never tried to hide them, William." Joyce headed toward the back door of the house. "You'd best come in... I caught Buffy's show. I knew we'd be seeing you sooner rather than later." 

"You're still looking good, Joyce. It's good to see you again." Spike hedged until he knew where Joyce was headed, but that didn't mean that he didn't mean every word. In fact, he knew better than to try to lie to this woman, who had always been able to read him so easily.

"You're back for good, aren't you?" Joyce asked as she tipped some milk into a small pan to heat.

Spike shrugged. "That depends on Buffy. If we can... If she'll let me."

She turned looking him straight in the eye as she said her next words. "You were right to leave. It was the right thing. Buffy couldn't see it. She was eighteen, she was in love, and she still thought that love would be the answer to everything. You ...weren't quite so naive. How am I doing so far?"

"I'm not sure... I don't think there's one... It was a lot of things."

"You never felt like your mother got a chance to live up to her potential, did you? You always felt that having a child so young, getting married at seventeen, that she missed out on her chance at life."

"Christ, Joyce. You know as well as I do that she never had a chance. They had to bloody elope to Scotland 'cause she wasn't even old enough to get married without her parent's consent in England. She got into Oxford, and she gave it up, to bring up a kid, that if she'd had any sense, she should have aborted." Spike's hand raked through his hair loosening his curls from the hold of the gel that fixed them. "It's a miracle she didn't end up hating both of us."

"Maybe ...but she didn't. She loved you both. She loved your dad so much, that she couldn't cope with it when she lost him." Joyce's voice softened as she spoke of Drusilla's broken mind. "But you wanted Buffy to have the chances she never got, didn't you? And you knew that as long as you stayed in contact, she wouldn't let go..."

"You're making me sound like Johnny Oates, Joyce. I'm not sayin' you're entirely wrong. I'm just saying that if you're right, it was only ever one tiny part of the equation. An' I didn't reason everythin' out and decide what was best. I was scared, and I ran. Full stop."

"You did what you felt was right. At times, the difference between instinct and logic isn't as big as people like to think. I'm just surprised it took you this long to make it back."

Spike's eyes briefly clouded over before he tossed his head back, raising his chin in a subconscious gesture of defiance. "By the time I was out of the army, she was already wed to that... guy. She deserved a chance to make it work, without me stickin' my nose in where it wasn't wanted."

"It's been three years since the divorce."

Spike looked round the room, his gaze finally settling on his feet. "I stopped writin' after the wedding." Spike gave Joyce a guilty glance, realising he'd given himself and his accomplice away. "An' then, when... My job. It's not something a married man should do."

"I had a feeling you would have kept tabs on her. So who was it? Dawn?" Joyce queried.

"Yeah, but after I left the army, we kinda lost touch. I didn't know about the divorce till I ran into her just before Christmas."

"And this job?"

"I'm thinkin' I'm probably goin' to quit. It's pretty much lost its appeal. It was easy money, but I think it's time I moved on."

Joyce nodded her head and passed him a steaming-hot mug of cocoa.

~+~

Spike knew it was a bad idea, but he didn't let it stop him. He was just so far beyond caring. He sauntered back in the direction of his hotel, taking a route that brought him alongside the parked car. Miller, it seemed, had drawn the short straw. He was awake and keeping an eye on the hotel, watching in case a light came on in Spike's room. Gates was sleeping, his face resting against the car's side window. Or he was asleep, until Spike rapped sharply on the glass.

The window whined its way down, and Spike bent over so he could see both the car's occupants.

"I figured you guys must be gettin' a bit tired of all this by now, so I thought maybe a couple of double espressos would do the trick."

Forrest looked uncertainly at the cardboard tray that Spike held by the open window. Spike rolled his eyes. "Why would I be trying to poison you, when I've already proven I can just avoid you if I want to? For all you know, I could have done whatever it might be that you think I should be doing, before I made the detour to the coffee-shop." Spike pressed the tray into Forrest's unresisting hands and walked off whistling "I Fought the Law." As he neared the hotel's entrance, Forrest, still holding the tray, climbed out of the car. The station wagon then did a rapid three point turn, as the other agent, presumably, went to check the well-being of Spike's target.

~+~

The station wagon was, once more, parked outside the radio station. The two agents watched as the black Lincoln pulled up outside the Espresso Pump. "What's the deal with this guy?" Forrest complained. "Why can't he just do his job, so that we can do our job and head for home?"

"What d' you mean, why can't he do his job?" Graham looked over at his companion. "You are not supposed to be the cheering section for the bad guy. We are meant to be the good guys."

"Let me get this straight." Forrest looked over at Graham. "We're the good guys. When he does his job, that makes him the bad guy. At which point, we, the good guys can do our job without becoming the bad guys. But up until five years ago, he was doing our job, taking out the bad guys so that he was the good guy. But, don't you think it would be better if we could just do our job, without waiting for him to do his job, because then we would be preventing the bad guy from doing the bad thing?"

Graham shook his head and gave his partner a rueful smile that somehow bordered on boyish. "You know it doesn't work that way."

An identical town car pulled into the spot next to Spike's. "And hell-o, Angelus." Forrest supplied commentary. "Ooh. It looks like our friend's brown-bagging it today... I wonder if he'll play nice with our Mr Blank?" 

~+~

Spike reached below the table, pulling a small gun from an ankle holster that was made convenient by his cross-legged position. Angelus quickly crossed the room and took a seat opposite. For a few seconds each tensed with their fingers on the trigger before they laid their weapons aside, Spike's hidden by a napkin, Angelus's still in its brown paper bag.

"What brings you to California, Liam?" Spike was careful to give the name just the right amount of derision.

His counterpart was spared from answering when a waitress wandered over and started to recite the day's specials. Neither man even looked in her direction as they placed their orders. They were too busy watching each other's eyes for the give-away flicker that would precede an attack.

Angelus watched as Spike picked up and swallowed the various tablets and capsules he had laid out ready on the table. "What are those?"

"Nutrients."

"Here's the new stuff, boy. Durazac 15. Makes Prozac look like your morning coffee." He tossed a small container from his coat pocket onto the table. "Keep 'em. I've got boatloads."

"I don't take that shit any more," Spike answered.

"And he wonders why he's got the shakes. Now I know how all those burn-out rumours got started."

"Well that's fascinating, but some of us came here to eat, not discuss your drug habits."

"I heard about the little blow out you had at the seven-eleven."

"Really?" Spike arched his brow. "One of yours?"

"Me. No. I'm still hoping we can come to some sort of agreement, work together again. I heard it was some indie Frog. Some Basque separatist turned capitalist from the Pyrenees. Are you sure Oregon doesn't ring a bell? Pacific North West? Something about some wonder dog? Cujo?"

"Budro. If you're going to make it such a joke, at least get the damn name right."

Angelus gave a smile that reached nowhere near his eyes. "Budro. Cujo. What's the difference?"

"Look, is it my fault if the bloody wankers I got paid to off were using dynamite to flush game, and the stupid gits go and borrow a soddin' retriever. I didn't touch the damn dog."

"Yeah, well. What I hear, word on the street says that your marks "borrowed" your client's prize hunting pooch. So bad luck for the bow-wow and bad luck for you, boy."

"Let's forget about Budro. How about we talk about the two No Such Agency's sat in the station wagon out front. Word is you set me up."

"Me?"

"Yeah. You."

"As if. Look, why don't we get our relationship straight?"

"We don't have a relationship. Get it? I got into this line of work because I don't do relationships. If I was the little team player you want me to be, I'd be sitting in Fort Dix or some other army stomping ground with a hundred other guys all dressed in the same little uniforms. I didn't fit in that little box. Look at me. Look at the way I'm dressed for Christ sake. I don't do teamwork. Lone gunman. Emphasis on lone. If you want to have coffee and doughnuts with your co-workers, why don't you join the bloody police force?

If it makes you feel any better, the chances are this is going to be my last job. So what do you say we both put away the guns, forget the whole thing, and have some breakfast?"

Something in Angelus eye gave him away before he moved, and Spike was just as quick to grab his own gun, resulting in another stand-off. "No scabs. From right now all jobs, all arrangements, all contracts are regulated."

"With you as the new boss?"

"Yes."

"Don't think so."

"Okay, but you aren't going to do your job, because we are. And once we've done that job, then we're going to do another little job."

"Do tell." Spike's calm scorn infused the two words as Angelus' voice resonated with cold menace.

"We're going to blow a hole right through that lily-white forehead of yours, and just to prove you can be useful, I'm going to let every guy that works for me fuck the brain-hole."

"You know I always wondered, with how you were about the clothes and the hair, but I guess that proves it really is blokes you fantasise about."

This was the point the unfortunate and reluctant waitress chose to return with their meals. Spike reached out as if to take his plate from her, but let it fall to the floor instead. As the waitress was slightly off-balance, bending to pick up the pieces, he pushed her toward Angelus, backing rapidly toward the door with his gun still drawn but hidden. Neither man could get a clear shot on the other, and Spike bet that Angelus would bide his time, rather than risk injuring innocent bystanders, not out of any feelings of compassion, but just because it made life more complicated. He bet right.

~+~

All day, Spike had had nothing to do except call his psychiatrist and get ready for the reunion. By rights, he should have been spick and span and on Buffy's doorstep, by now. Instead, he was wandering round his hotel room with his shirt undone waiting for Cordelia to pick up the phone. On the second ring, she answered.

"Cordy? It's Spike," he cut-in before she could get a word in. "I've been trying to get Doc Rosenberg, but she's not answering my calls, and I'm already late for the re-union. Look, can you ring round? Try her at home, in her car, at her gym, wherever you can think of but get a hold of her and patch her through. I need to speak to her right now."

"Alright. Breathe, Spike. I'm on it."

Spike stood in front of the mirror as he fastened his shirt and tie. He'd decided to prove to Buffy he could look like a grown-up when he wanted to, and he was back in the black Armani. He practised various lines with varying degrees of sincerity as he worked.

"Hiiii. I'm Spike. Remember me?"

"Yeah. I'm a pet psychiatrist. I have an office in Iowa where I treat cows with post-traumatic stress syndrome."

"Me? I sell couch insurance. Mm-hm. Mm-hm. You do?"

"Yeah, I lead a small cult. Some of the members were originally with Bader-Meinhof, but I managed to convert them. Every month we sacrifice a goat and deflower any virgins who might have joined. What about you?"

"Yeah, you look great. Oh, you married a plastic surgeon... Uh-huh. Wish I'd thought of doing that."

As he straightened his collar, he let the fake smile he'd been practising fade away.

"Hi. I'm William Blank. Remember me? I'm not married. I don't have any kids, and I'd blow your head off if someone paid me enough."

Disclaimer: This site is operated on a non-profit basis, purely for entertainment purposes. Use of any non-original material within the site in no way implies ownership, be it from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel the Series or any other film, television, musical or other source. 


	12. Chapter 12

Grosse Pointe Buff by TalesOfSpike 

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Pointe Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

Chapter 12 

Buffy sat on her bed, gently waving her fingers in an effort to make her nails dry more quickly. She double-checked that everything else was ready. She checked the view from her window, yet again, hoping to see Spike's big, black, hire car pulling up, but still there was no sign. She walked over to the mirror and scanned her reflection. Her black pants had survived her sitting down without becoming unattractively wrinkled. The ivory satin waistcoat she wore in lieu of a blouse looked crisp and smart, and the black jacket with ivory satin facings, which completed the suit, hung ready on its hanger for when Spike turned up. She glanced over to where the numerals on her alarm clock glowed a putrescent shade of lime green. He was already ten minutes late. Maybe his nail varnish was taking too long to dry. Or maybe he wasn't coming? Maybe she was going to sit here and wait for him all over again.

~+~

"Red, listen, don't hang up. Just listen. I haven't killed anyone, but this guy did try to kill me, so if I see him again I'm definitely going to kill him, but I'm not going to kill anyone else. Well, except for the guy that I'm here to kill, and well, there's these other two guys who're following me round, so if they get in the way I might have to kill them, but other than that...

Anyway, I saw my mom, and well, she's completely off her trolley... but she seems happy, so I suppose it's not so bad. And I saw Buffy. In fact, I'm on my way to the reunion with Buffy. I should have picked her up already, but the whole thing's got me a bit hyper, so I thought I'd give you a call, and you could maybe give me some advice or something..."

"Okay, Spike. All you need to do is calm down a little. Repeat after me, "I am at home with the "me". I am rooted in the "me" who is on this adventure." The petite redhead's voice had a happy sing-song quality to it.

"Out loud?"

"Yes, out loud. It works better if you can actually hear yourself say it."

"I'll sound like some sort of poof."

"Spike, if you're not going to do what I ask you to do, then why bother ringing?"

Spikes voice came down the phone in a deeply embarrassed monotone. "I am at home in the "me". I am rooted in the "me" who is on this adventure."

"O-okay. Now take a deep breath and then say, "This is "me" breathing."

Spike gulped in a lungful of air and then let it out almost in a sigh. "This is "me" breathing."

"Good. Now go do that. Keep it up as long as you can while you're getting ready, and while you drive over. It should help you focus and let you calm down a bit. Just keep repeating it... And, Spike, don't kill anybody."

"Right."

Spike put down the phone and pulled open the top drawer of the dressing table. Taking out the 9mm automatic he'd used at the supermarket, he ejected the clip, checking it was loaded before he slid it back into place. He stood in front of the mirror for a second, the gun in his hand seeming entirely natural to him. He manipulated the slider, so that the first round was chambered, loosing another sigh as he did so. "This is me breathing," he said to his gun-toting reflection.

Putting the gun back down in the drawer, he checked over his appearance one last time, making minute adjustments to his tie and collar. He looked in the mirror and wondered what had become of the youth he used to be, and more importantly, who was he now? 

"Yeah... You're a handsome devil. What's your name?" he asked himself. Maybe it was because he wanted to change the answer to the question his inner voice was asking him that he pushed the drawer closed without taking the gun out. Or maybe it was just dumb luck.

~+~

Buffy leaned out of the window slightly so she could check the street in both directions. She let her gaze drift back to the clock and finally let her exasperation get the better of her. "This is so not happening again." She grabbed the phone book from the bottom shelf of her bookcase and dialled the number for Spike's hotel.

~+~

The phone's ring sounded startlingly loud in the hotel bedroom because of the absence of the usual clutter that would help deaden the sound. A hand hovered over the receiver for a second before moving instead to pick up the printed reunion invitation that lay next to it. Tucking the invitation into his pocket, Luke Aurelius left the room.

~+~

The sound of a car's engine drew Buffy's gaze back to the street. She gave a sigh of relief, hanging up the phone as the Lincoln pulled to a stop in front of the house. She slid her jacket off the hanger, pulling it on as she made her way downstairs at a pace faster than a walk, but not really quick enough to justify being described as a run. Spike had just rung the doorbell when she pulled the door open. He drew a bunch of roses and baby's breath from behind his back with a flourish worthy of a stage magician.

Buffy smiled but couldn't refrain from commenting on his tardiness. "Flowers. Cute. But maybe you should have spent the money on a watch instead..."

Spike shrugged apologetically and pulled back the cuffs of his shirt to show the timepiece on his wrist.

"Well, I'll just go put these in the waste disposal or something. Mom's working late, but Giles is in the den. I kinda get the feeling he wanted a couple of words."

Buffy took the route through the dining room to reach the kitchen, pushing Spike in the direction of the front room. He knocked gently on the doorjamb before sauntering into the room.

"Mr Giles. It's Spike or well, Joyce always called me William, William Blank. Em, Buffy said you wanted to see me."

Giles put down his copy of "Archaeology of the Indigenous Peoples of California," and looked up at Spike with a familiar exasperated expression, before removing his glasses and pulling a handkerchief from his pocket with which to clean them. "Spike, I may be ten years older, but I'm not entirely senile, yet."

"Ehm, no. Sorry. Good evening. How are you?"

"Hmm. Technically, you still beat the millennia. I guess that means Joyce wins our little bet."

"Yeah, she did say she expected me sooner. Just wanted to say hello, see how you were..."

Giles replaced his now sparkling glasses. "Spike, I don't know where you've been since you abandoned Buffy ten years ago, and I can't say that I particularly care, either.

It's good that you left. I'm glad that you did. You seem to have grown up a bit, gained some sort of direction to your life. Or perhaps I misjudged you?"

Spike shrugged. "I don't know. I mean I hope so..."

"I visualised you, when I gave it any thought, as some sort of roadie or something, following round behind some of those punk bands you used to play all the time." Giles serious facade slipped, and he let an ironic smile turn up his lips at one side. "Now, Pink Floyd I could have understood..."

Spike shook his head. "'Fraid not, though if The Clash had still been touring and were prepared to take on an eighteen year old with no experience as Tour Manager or something, then maybe things would have turned out a bit different. No, I went the other way. Six figures. Doing business with mercenary sensibilities, ruthless enterprise, cutthroat attitude, you know. Sports sex, no real relationships... What about you?"

"You know me. Still digging holes all over the West Coast wherever they'll pay me. There's this hugely important site that we found not too far from here. It was supposed to just be a token dig, before they levelled the area for..." Giles realised that his enthusiasm had caused him to run on. "But you don't really want to hear about that.

Bugger it. Let's have a drink and forget the whole damn thing." Giles had poured one generous measure of Scotch before Spike could respond.

"I'd love to, but I think Buffy would kill me if I make her any later than I already have, so... Just wanted to say hi, see how you were..."

"So what exactly have you been doing with your life then, Spike?"

"Uh, professional killer."

Giles raised his glass. "Good for you. I hear it's a growth industry." He picked up his book and was engrossed again before Spike had even left the room.

"Okay. Well, it's been good seeing you again."

Spike was rewarded by a non-committal grunt from behind the book.

~+~

The Lincoln pulled into the parking lot across the road from the school building, as Forrest and Graham watched, debating Spike's sincerity.

Graham watched the two as Spike rushed to open Buffy's door for her. "Okay, he's definitely fallen for her."

Forrest gave his head a decisive shake. "No way, man. He's just using her."

"Just look at them. Look at the pair of them together. She looks real pretty with her hair up like that," Graham argued.

"Yeah, she's a hottie, and she's got herself all prettied up just for him," Forrest countered. "But he's just usin' her. I'm goin' to enjoy killing that bastard."

"Me too," Graham finally agreed.

~+~

Buffy surveyed the other couples making their way to the auditorium. "I should have worn a skirt." She half-turned back toward the car before Spike caught her elbow. 

He assessed her appearance in the light that spilled from the nearby building, taking in the way the vest and the pearl choker she wore set off her California tan, the way wisps of hair escaped the clips she'd used to pin up the glossy waves, and how her eyes still had that same luminescence he remembered. "Buffy, you look absolutely gorgeous. Ten years on, and you are still going to be the prettiest girl in the room. You glow."

Buffy smiled and turned toward the school once more, her confidence boosted. Spike, however, became more anxious as he neared the building, realising how easy it would be for someone to infiltrate the gathering. "I should have brought the gun," he muttered under his breath.

"What was that?" Buffy asked in a startled tone.

"Nothing, nothing..." Spike demurred despite the obvious tension in his tone. "Just saying this should be fun." Spike ground his teeth together and forced himself to go on into the building.

Disclaimer: This site is operated on a non-profit basis, purely for entertainment purposes. Use of any non-original material within the site in no way implies ownership, be it from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel the Series or any other film, television, musical or other source.


	13. Chapter 13

Grosse Pointe Buff by TalesOfSpike 

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

Chapter 13 

Buffy let Spike slip his hand into hers as they moved into the entrance hall. They hung back to one side to take in the scene before they made their way into the throng. Surprisingly little had changed since the days when Buffy used to wave her pom-poms. There had been token efforts made to make the hall less redolent of the boys' locker room and more like a dance. Crepe paper decorations were wound around the basketball hoops. Only every third row of fluorescents was lit, but whether the decoration committee were trying for intimate lighting, or whether they were trying to disguise some of the less pleasant aspects of the high school gym, was anyone's guess.

Eventually, they jostled each other into a position where they were confronted by the self-appointed "greeter" for the night.

"Welcome back, Dalesman. It's Nancy Doyle-Stevens."

Buffy and Spike responded to the insincere smiles of the girl Buffy vaguely remembered as teacher's pet in their English class.

"Hiii," answered Spike, if anything outdoing Nancy in the raging insincerity stakes. "How're you?" He had a funny feeling he'd now said more to the woman than he ever had in high school.

"I'm good."

"William," Spike responded automatically, knowing that the ID badges that were arrayed across the table wouldn't show his nickname. When the woman continued to look at him with a total lack of recognition, he added his surname to the introduction.

"Oh, William Blank." She began to sift through the badges in a particular area of the table. "Yes, there you are... Why you haven't changed a bit." As she passed the card over to Spike, he recognised his yearbook picture plastered over half the badge. 

"Nice of you to say so, pet," Spike responded with a rakish grin.

"Hi, Buffy." The woman snatched a card from the table and thrust it into Buffy's hand. She must have had some sort of psychic positioning ability because Buffy could have sworn her eyes never left the table. "Just love your show," she continued in a tone that said she did anything but.

The corners of Buffy's mouth turned up while her eyes narrowed into a hard glare. "Oh thanks. Well, you're our demographic."

"I gather you got married, Nancy?" Spike tried to intervene before someone got cut on all the brittle.

"Why, yes, I did. And three children. It's really neat." Her tone brightened again as she spoke to Spike and Buffy began to wonder if Nancy particularly hated her, particularly liked Spike or if she just wasn't good with other women. Nancy continued on regardless, gesturing at one of the badges from the table. "I had the yearbook pictures put on so that everybody knows who everybody was."

"For special torture..." drawled Spike.

Nancy managed a sound that was somewhere between a sigh and a dutiful laugh before she smiled at the couple behind Spike and Buffy and started all over again, intimating their audience was at an end. "Hi, It's Nancy Doyle-Stevens."

As Spike and Buffy moved away from the table she managed a ,"bye-bye, now, kids," before she took to persecuting the next arrivals.

"Who needs hard liquor?" Spike asked steering them toward the bar.

"Meeee," responded Buffy before enquiring after Spike. "How are you holding up?"

"A bit shaky," Spike admitted.

"Okay, straight to the bar for us."

"Y'know, I'm starting to remember some of these faces."

"What can I get ya?" the barman asked.

"Ehm, bourbon, rocks, double," said Spike, adding, "two," when he looked over at Buffy and she nodded.

"No problem," responded the barman turning away to fetch the drinks.

"So," asked Spike, "how long d'you think before we have to actually start relating to people?"

"Umm, soon, like nowish," supplied Buffy, since she had the advantage of being able to watch Scott Hope's approach by looking over Spike's shoulder.

"Hey, Buffy ...and Spike. I didn't recognise you from behind."

"Scott. How are you doing?"

"I'm in law. I've got my own practice down the bottom end of Main Street. It's a bit of a challenge covering everything, but in a one Starbucks town there isn't really room to specialise. Here, why don't you take this?" Scott held out a business card and then reassessed Spike's suit and drew his hand back. "Actually, I've got one here, for those special clients." He reached into his inside pocket and pulled out a Mont Blanc pen, which he passed to Spike. "Don't forget to check the cap."

"I won't," said Spike as the bartender returned with his and Buffy's drinks. "Look, we're going to go circulate a bit, see who's here. We'll catch up with you later?" Spike suggested. 

The blonde pair wandered off in search of more entertaining company. For the most part, the party reeked of desperation. You had the ex-high school princesses, desperate to prove that they were still as superior as ever. You had the former honour roll students who had big stars on their ID badges as if it were the things they had achieved by the age of eighteen that defined them. You had the former geeks with a point to prove because they couldn't just let their teenage humiliations go. There was the former chubby teenage girl, wearing a dress so short and tight it was almost obscene, just to prove that, now, she had the figure for it. All around the room people were desperately trying to pass themselves off as something better than they were, afraid that whatever their achievements they would be measured by their failures. If they had the money, they wanted the family. If they had the family, they wanted the career. People tried to impress people they'd barely even noticed in their high school years.

Finally, after a stream of passing encounters, where Spike avoided having to talk about himself by the simple expedient of pretending interest in everyone else, Buffy spotted Anya. "Hey, look, someone I actually used to know. I'm going to go catch up with Anya. Okay?"

Spike decided this was a good time to pay the bar a return visit, and got halfway there before Xander intercepted him. "Hey, Spike, man. How're you holding up there?"

"So-so, I think. How 'bout you?"

"Hey, I'd be in heaven... if I were a masochist. It's like taking all the rejections I got in three years worth of high school and squashing them into one fun-filled night of hell. So far I haven't even managed a dance."

"You sound like someone else in need of a drink." Spike resumed his progress with Xander in tow.

"Hey, Spike." Spike turned to be confronted by an attractive blonde he only vaguely remembered as a younger brunette.

"Hi, ...Aura," he managed. "How're you? You look good."

"Hey, Aura," Xander vied for the blonde's attention.

"You too. Nice suit," Aura admired Spike's sartorial elegance, ignoring Xander completely. "You learn to spot these things when you're in the trade."

"That's right. You're a model aren't you?" Spike tried to make polite conversation, rather than bring up her Depends commercials.

"It's Xander. Xander Harris. Remember we had about ten classes together...You were at my eighth birthday party..."

This last appeared to spark some recognition. "Eugh..." Aura made a face and backed off. "Well, maybe I'll catch up with you later, Spike," she threw in as a parting shot. 

Spike looked over at Xander. "Remind me not to ask what happened at your eighth birthday party."

"You don't want to know, man. You don't want to know. Suffice to say Uncle Rory decided to pay a visit as the peppermint scented party clown."

"So, like, this is just a suggestion, but maybe the women who've been party to some of the most humiliating moments of your formative years aren't exactly going to be the ones you have the best chance of impressing."

"It's okay, Spike. I'm not looking to date my sister." Xander, typically, used humour as an emotional shield.

"Seriously, man. You don't need Aura Buckingham's approval. You've got that whole property development thing going. You're making a go of things. Stop trying so hard, and maybe you'll meet the right girl and things'll fall into place." 

"And you're speaking from experience, here?"

"No, but then... there's only ever been one girl that I wanted." Spike's gaze travelled to the corner of the room before he made determined headway toward the bar.

~+~

Xander had, of course, gone off in search of further humiliations, and Spike decided to make his way to the bleachers at one side of the room for some quiet contemplation when he realised he had been called.

"Will?"

Spike turned, making his way to the table where the young tawny-blonde in the floral dress was sitting.

"Tara, pet. Where you been hiding?" Spike asked with a genuine smile.

"Right here, in full view. How are you?"

"I'm good. How you been?" Spike found his attention transfixed by the toddler on her knee.

"I'm good." She flashed her left hand toward Spike, showing a plain gold band. "I'm married to a wonderful woman."

"And?" Spike pointed a finger toward the baby.

"Robbie. He's adopted. There were other options, but it seemed right to give him the chance of a loving home."

"And how is it all. It's not all as easy as they tell you it's going to be, is it?"

Tara gave him a contented smile. "It's not easy, but it's great."

"Really?"

"Yeah. It's so great. People think that when you get married you lose your freedom."

"You don't?"

"No. It gets better and better. So how are you? How's your life?"

"In progress..." Spike answered with a wry grin, which in turn provoked a knowing smirk from the blonde opposite.

"Yeah?" She held the toddler out toward Spike. "Why don't you hold him for a minute while I get his bottle?"

"Wha'?"

"It's okay. He won't break. Go ahead." Spike held the baby with a nervousness born of unfamiliarity, but when the kid gave him a gummy grin, he seemed to settle right in to it.

"Y' know the first year you seem to spend all your time just making sure they're warm and fed and everything else they need to stay alive."

"Yeah, I'd imagine they'd be kinda vulnerable."

"Yeah." Tara pulled the bottle from one of her bags and watched, amused, as Spike mirrored the various expressions that crossed the toddler's face on being confronted with this new person-sized plaything.

Buffy paused at the edge of the dancefloor, watching the threesome as Tara passed the bottle to Spike, instructing him on how to hold it so that the baby wouldn't gulp down air along with the juice.

She strolled slowly toward the group. "Hey, Tara, last time I saw you, you were still waiting for this little guy. How're you coping? Must be pretty desperate if you're letting Spike watch him."

"Heyyy!" responded Spike, while Tara gave an enigmatic smile.

"Seems to me he's doing a pretty good job, for an amateur."

Buffy looked back and forward between the other two blondes. "D'you think it would be okay if I held him for a while?"

~+~

Half an hour later, Buffy and Spike found themselves on a balcony, looking down on the auditorium but isolated in the semi-darkness. From there, they could watch Riley, who had had a couple too many at the free bar, trying to pick up the ex-cheerleaders who had flocked round him in his high school days. They knelt side by side, on the floor in front of the first row of seats, with their arms on the ledge that ran around the edge of the gallery. 

The music from below changed to a ballad, and Spike took the opportunity to speak, without shouting. "You know, I have recurring dreams about you. Five nights a week, for about six years, did I tell you?"

"No," answered Buffy. "No, I don't think you did. You know yesterday, on the radio..."

Spike smirked. "When you publicly humiliated me... I think I remember."

"Yeah, well, no more than you deserved. But, I think... maybe... I was kinda harsh, when I said you were broken."

"Yeah?" Buffy found herself staring into Spike's bottomless blue eyes. "So what's the current verdict?"

She let the corners of her mouth curl up just slightly. "I think... maybe broken goes a bit too far. I think that you're, say, mildly sprained or maybe really badly contused? Is that a word? But nothing that can't be fixed."

"For you, that's pretty much a compliment."

"Uh-huh." Stray curls swayed against the hollow of her cheeks as she slowly nodded her head.

"So, say, I didn't want to blow it, what should I say, now?"

"That you're glad you came back. That you're real happy to see me."

"Yeah. I am. I definitely am." Spike let his gaze scan Buffy's face for signs of doubt before he made his quiet apology. "I'm really sorry, if I buggered up your life."

Buffy smiled ruefully. "It's not over, yet." The two gazed into each other's eyes, the solemnity of where they were heading overcoming them both for a few seconds.

Finally, it was Buffy who broke the silence. "So, d'you have a wife down in Kentucky or somewhere?"

"Nope, not a one."

"Okay... In that case d'you want to dance?"

~+~

****

Chapter 14 contains the sort of content that is no longer allowed at this site. If you're old enough to read NC-17 material and you want to read it anyway, please copy and paste one of these links into your URL box and press enter. If you're not old enough or you don't want to defile your mind with such perversity, then don't worry, it's just a flashback chapter and you won't miss any of the plot. Just skip on to Chapter 15.

Normal version 


	14. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

Note: Flashbacks are shown in italics 

Chapter 15

Spike led the way to the dance floor, finally feeling like he'd found his way home. Buffy swayed in his arms as if he'd never left, her face tilted up for his kisses. For the first time in months, Spike's inner voice seemed to just shut up and let him be. He revelled in the sense of belonging he felt. One more job, and he could start over. Together, with Buffy. He could start planning for the future. He could have a future. The music changed tempo, becoming too upbeat for both his and Buffy's taste. 

"Let's go for a walk," Buffy whispered directly into Spike's ear. She walked off the dance floor, using Spike's tie as if it were a leash. The pair walked the quiet school corridors, stopping often to kiss or to hug. Spike figured it was probably some sort of arrested development thing, but since it was the best thing that'd happened to him in about half a decade, he certainly wasn't complaining. Buffy eyed the doors of the classrooms as they passed, until they came to the nurse's office. Buffy turned the handle and gave a wide smile when it opened to her touch.

"You know, I feel ill. I think I might just have to go in here, and have a lie-down," she said in a teasing tone.

"I think you should," Spike retaliated. "But, just in case it's infectious, I'd best stay with you, kinda like a self-imposed quarantine zone. It wouldn't be responsible if I wandered around on my own and spread some disease." He slid through the door behind her and locked them in.

Their bodies responded to each other as if the intervening years had never happened. Spike was thankful they were finally out of sight of the rest of the party-goers. Suit trousers, however expensive the suit, were not as effective as skin-tight denim at keeping a raging hard-on constrained. His hands slipped Buffy's jacket from her shoulders as she pulled her lips away from his long enough to make an observation.

"I know you Brits like to complain that SoCal doesn't have any weather, but you seem to have brought your own private rain cloud with you. You're going to have to come out from under it before we can even begin-"

Spike on the other hand only managed a few words of rebuttal at a time because he couldn't resist the fullness of Buffy's lips when she pretended to pout.

"And it's just like a typical California girl. A little rain follows me to town, and you're already making plans to bail..." Spike gripped Buffy by the waist, lifting her so she sat on one of the counters facing him. Her legs automatically crossed behind his back, drawing him toward her. The heat he could feel emanating from her centre gave her away every bit as much as his erection brushing her inner thigh did him. His hand slid up into the back of her hair, drawing her in for a deeper kiss, while her fingers traced the corded muscles of his back under the smooth lines of the suit. 

'This,' thought Spike, 'is what I should have been doing for the last ten years.' A decade of longing infused every frantic caress and every kiss as they tried to reclaim the lost time.

"It's been so long I've forgotten who gets tied up." Spike regretted the words as soon as they left his mouth. Buffy pulled back away from him.

"Wait."

"What?" Spike asked wondering how she could deny the wellspring of desire that they had tapped.

"No. No little boy lost voice. Just stop."

"Stop?" Spike took a step back, leaving some breathing space between them. "What's wrong? Too fast?"

"I'm sorry," Buffy responded, her confusion evident as she hopped down off the counter.

"Too fast?" Spike asked again. The query sounded almost hopeful, as if he was afraid it might be some more serious problem between them, but he hoped it wasn't.

"No-I, Yeah, maybe. It's like something. Something's missing... something..."

"What?"

"Wait. I know..." Buffy lashed out with her fist, catching him square on the nose, just like always. Her lips parted in a broad grin. "That was it. Welcome home."

Spike's answering grin made his eyes light up like blue neon, and Buffy melted back into his arms as he ducked his head to steal another kiss. They fumbled their way back to the bench, without their lips losing contact, Spike's hands instinctively undoing the buttons down the front of Buffy's waistcoat. As it sailed across the room, their lips finally parted long enough for them both to draw gasping breaths.

Buffy couldn't hold the words in any longer. She'd ached to say them since his car pulled up in front of the radio station that first day, but every self-preservation instinct she had had kept them locked away inside, until now. "God, I missed you."

~+~

Downstairs, the tide of arrivals had slowed to a trickle and then stopped. Nancy Doyle-Stevens had been abandoned by her helpers and sat alone at the table, where only a sparse few unclaimed badges remained. She rested her head on her arms, secure in the knowledge that none of the revellers in the adjacent room would come to check on her. She could spend weeks organising the event, designing stationery, tracking down far-flung alumni through her job with the IRS, but no-one would actually notice that she missed out on the party. No-one would come to chat with her while she kept her lonely vigil. No-one would bring her a plate of food from the finger-buffet. Hell, no-one would even come to relieve her for five minutes to go to the washroom.

The outer door scraped open, and she sprang back to life, her welcome for this late arrival every bit as pert and false as her words to the first-comers, even if she couldn't quite summon the enthusiasm to rise from her seat any more.

"Welcome back, Dalesman. It's Nancy Doyle-Stevens. And who might you be?"

The newcomers gaze flicked rapidly to the table, alighting on the nearest ID.

"It is me, Freddie Iverson," answered the one-time terrorist, with the precise, measured turn of phrase that generally marks someone who isn't speaking their native language, or has an IQ that falls far below anything with three figures.

Nancy picked up the badge from its spot and looked from the picture to the man in front of her. "My, you have changed. And spent some time overseas. The time down the gym really has paid off." She passed over the badge, her gaze following the tall well-muscled figure as he moved toward the auditorium. "Save a dance for me, now," she called as he walked through the far doors.

What he saw as he entered the room convinced him that all the worst things he'd heard about the reunion system were true. An area had cleared around what appeared to be a major hazard in the middle of the dance floor. It appeared that the DJ had been unwise enough to include the can-can in his selection for the evening, and it looked as if a one-time basketball star, or football player, had decided to perform the traditional high-kicks without taking into consideration that the group of ex-cheerleaders he had tried to join in with, were ill-equipped to support his weight, even in the days before his expanding waistline.

The girls all pulled away from his still reaching hands and regained their feet, leaving Riley sitting on the floor by himself.

~+~

Neither Buffy nor Spike was dressed quite so neatly as when they went in, but they'd only got dressed because they were afraid they would lose track of time and get locked in overnight. Under the circumstances, they both figured clothes were a major achievement. Spike all but carried Buffy from the room, pulling the door closed behind them. Buffy's arms were wrapped round his neck, and his hands rested on her waist, limiting their movement to a slow shuffle, that was, nevertheless, made even slower by the fact they celebrated two out of three steps with a lingering kiss.

"What d'you say to a couple of weeks away, pet. Take off, just the pair of us, have some time to ourself. Work this whole thing out, see whether we can make a go of it..."

"Will there be shopping?"

"If you want," Spike offered, "there can be shopping."

"I'm in."

Buffy managed to extricate herself from his clutches, backing away toward the sound of The Thompson Twins.

"Where're you going?" Spike questioned her.

"Well, you know. There's some people I should say goodbye to. Civic duty and all that."

Spike made a face at the thought of all Buffy's cheerleader friends. "Well, I think I'll have myself a fag-break, head back this way and meet you out front."

"I'll find you," Buffy promised as she backed away.

Spike pulled his lighter and cigarettes from a pocket, blatantly ignoring the "No Smoking" signs and taking his chances with the sprinkler system as he lit up. Buffy finally turned, suit jacket dangling over her shoulder, swaying with her hips as she strolled away. She pushed open the fire door at the end of the corridor, only to come face to face with Riley for about the thousandth time that night. 

As they moved past each other in the confined space, Riley gave her a knowing snigger, and she knew he'd smelled Spike's scent on her. She hated seeing him like this. Monday morning, he'd be back at his dad's car dealership, selling BMW's to young executives, who were making do until they could afford a Mercedes. He'd be sober and respectful, everyone's best friend, at least until the paperwork got signed. For now, he was the drunken bully, with a chip on his shoulder because of the injury that had cut short his college basketball career and prevented him from becoming the white Dennis Rodman. She glanced back as she turned the corner to enter the stairwell, watching as he made his lurching way toward Spike.

Spike treated him much the same as he had all night, and most of the time he'd known him. He gave him a nod as he walked past, taking the cigarette from his mouth long enough to acknowledge the fact of his existence. "Riley."

"Buffy Summers, huh? You gonna hit that shit again?"

Spike inhaled deeply, his voice rising to well above conversational levels. "I'm fine, Finn. How're you?"

"You think you're real smart, don't you? Come on. Let's see how smart you are with my foot up your ass?" Riley closed the gap between him and Spike as Buffy peered round the corner. He towered over Spike by inches and probably weighed half as much again as the Englishman. For some reason, even as the belligerent, former athlete peeled his jacket from his shoulders, Buffy realised she wasn't worried for Spike, she was worried about what he might do.

Spike just tilted his head back, so that he looked the other man square in the eye. "D'you really think that there's some stored up conflict that exists between us? There is no "us". You were with Buffy, and you blew it. End of story. No more to tell." Spike pointed back and forth from himself to the other man, wafting smoke under his nose in the process. ""We" don't exist. So who are you mad at, here? It's not me." Spike gripped the lapels of Riley's jacket and pulled them back up over his shoulders. "Now, what do you want to do here? What are you trying to achieve?"

Riley pulled a rumpled scrap of paper from his pocket, holding it out toward Spike, reminding him of a small child passing a used tissue back to their parent.

"Finn, I don't know what that is?"

"These are my words."

"You wrote something. See, that's the proper- Express yourself. Go For It."

"A Schroedinger's Life by Riley Finn."

"Good title, deep. I mean that says so much before you even get to the story."

"It's a poem. There are fifteen verses."

"Okay, how about you skip to the end."

Riley peered at the paper, holding it no more than a couple of inches from his face, then turning it over before he continued.

"Alone... just me and my cat."

Against his better judgement Spike found himself wondering if Riley was referring to a real animal or the hypothetical beast in a box that Schroedinger's principle talked about. "Really, I liked it a lot. Maybe you should get your own web site or something..."

"You wanna go down to the courts, shoot some hoops?"

"No, no, I don't."

Spike unexpectedly found himself crushed in a bear hug.

"I missed you," Riley spouted in Spike's ear.

Spike somewhat gingerly patted at the larger man's back. "Okay, I missed you too."

The two pulled apart, and Buffy ducked back into the stairwell to avoid being seen. Riley paused as if he were about to make some comment, and then looked at the piece of paper clutched in his fist as if he wondered how it had gotten there. His eyes flicked back to Spike, who smiled at him and gave him a half-wave as the larger man turned back in the direction he came from and shambled off.

Back downstairs, Buffy said her farewells and watched from the sidelines as Xander finally danced with Aura Buckingham.

Feedback: Craved in a manner that's most unbecoming. Tales@He-s-no-angel.net


	15. Chapter 16

****

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

****

Note: Flashbacks are shown in italics 

Chapter 16 

Just for old times sake, Spike decided to swing past his old locker. He stood in front of it for about five seconds with the dial in his hands, smoke curling up from the half-finished cigarette between his fingers. Then, the combination came back to him. He opened it up and found it bare of books and other odds and ends. Either no-one was using it this year, or the owner had taken the precaution of clearing it out before the homecoming hordes returned. The years had added layers to the stickers used to adorn the inside, but here and there a corner peeked through. Just as he was about to shut it, a figure emerged from the adjacent stairwell.

All Spike had time to notice was the gun swinging toward him. He grabbed the assassin's arm before his body even came into view, slamming it into the lockers three times before Luke's grip loosened enough to let the weapon fall to the brightly waxed floor. A stray kick was enough to send it halfway down the corridor. By now the larger man had overcome his surprise at being caught out. Pulling his injured hand from Spike's grip, he kneed the blond in the kidneys from behind with an agility that belied his size. Spike found himself pinned against the lockers with his back to his opponent as more kicks rained in. Craning his neck, he twisted his left hand until the red-hot tip of his cigarette pushed into the other man's eyeball. Spike felt himself freed as his counterpart let out a furious bellow. 

Turning to face his aggressor, Spike fell into a defensive stance. The two men traded kicks and punches for what must have been less than a brutal minute. Spike used his speed and the other man's limited vision to his advantage, but every time the other man managed to hit, his strength made it feel like a hammer blow. Finally, Spike managed to sweep the legs from under his teutonic opponent. He landed awkwardly, spraining his wrist as he fell with his back against the row of lockers. Spike pounced, using the moment of disorientation to smash the man's head back against the lockers repeatedly. Even then the Basque managed to fight back, his undamaged hand grasping at Spike's throat. Using his right arm to hold his attacker pinned against the ranks of cabinets, Spike reached into his suit pocket with his other hand, pulling out his only weapon. Flicking off the cap that bore Scott Hope's name, he stabbed the pen into the other man's neck, aiming for the jugular. When the hold on his throat eased, Spike sagged forward watching the blood that was spreading through the body's white shirt.

This was the point where Buffy came looking for him, running in her eagerness to get back to him. Spike's gaze travelled from her shocked face to the bloodstained pen in his hand and the body next to him.

"It's not me, Buffy. It-"

He watched as her face crumpled and heard her incoherent sobs as she ran to get away from him. He heard her, and he heard Xander's muffled tones as he met her on the stairs, only managing to slow her headlong flight.

Xander came skidding into the corridor, the same look of shock appearing on his face as had been on Buffy's. He looked from Spike's bruised and bloody face to the body on the floor.

"Hey. Is that- Is that his- that guy's blood?" he asked.

The question seemed to rouse Spike from his trance.

"Yeah. A thousand innocent people get killed every day..." He got to his feet and started pulling down a large paper banner from the wall.

Xander watched as Spike placed the banner on the floor at an angle to the body. He couldn't help asking even though he already knew the answer. "Is this guy dead?" 

Spike continued on as if the question had never been raised, starting to roll it so it was wrapped in a spiral of paper. "But a millionaire's pet goes boom, and you're marked for life... Give us a hand, here."

"Okay," answered Xander. Even though he was probably in shock, he couldn't help but find his friend's efficiency in dealing with dead bodies slightly chilling.

Spike pointed at a cloth banner that had hung over the corridor even when they were at school there. "Pull that down," he told Xander as he continued to wrap the corpse in its paper shroud.

"How'd he die?" Xander asked passing the cloth to Spike. The blond grabbed the cloth, using it to mop up the spilled blood, and then wrapping it around the dropped gun before pushing the bundle in behind the corpse's head and neatly tucking in the ends of the paper.

"He's a notorious terrorist. There's a contract out on my life."

"He is dead, though?" Xander asked, even as he helped with the last of the rolling and wrapping.

"D'you think this is an exercise in oversized origami?" Spike asked sarcastically before his voice softened. "He's dead, Xand. It was me or him." He took a breath and pointed at the end of the parcel Xander was holding. "Look, are his feet covered?"

The music got louder as they half carried the body downstairs and half slid it down the banister. They stumbled toward the boiler room, and between the two of them, managed to launch the corpse into the depths of the glowing industrial sized furnace. 

Spike let loose a stream of very British epithets as he pushed the furnace doors closed, but whether it was because he burnt himself on the hot metal or because of the whole situation, was anyone's guess as far as Xander was concerned.

"Thanks. Nobody's gonna come lookin' for this guy. Come on," his friend told him. Spike's arm fell around his shoulder. 

Xander watched the water flow red as Spike rinsed the blood from his hand. The two of them looked a mess, ties removed, shirts rumpled and innocence gone. By the time they made their weary way to the free bar, Xander was more than ready for the double whisky he ordered. He waited while the bartender fetched it and Spike's club soda.

Spike was asking everyone in the same zip code if they'd seen Buffy. He managed to make it sound conversational, just a polite inquiry. 'Nobody's seen her, you follicly-fried idiot. What did you think she was going to do? Make a detour to inform everybody in the auditorium that her boyfriend was a homicidal maniac while she ran for her life? If she had any sense, she was in the next state over by now. And so should you be,' Xander thought to himself.

He took a sip of the fiery liquid and walked up to Spike with his right hand outstretched. "Hi. I'm Xander Harris. I'm in construction. What do you do, Spike?"

Spike's gaze flicked from Xander to the bartender, to Scott Hope who still stood exactly where Spike and Buffy had left him earlier, and to the few others who stood nearby before he looked sheepishly at his shoes, unable to answer.

"What now? Chase the girl?"

Spike shook his head. "No. If you see Buffy, just tell her I'm sorry."

It took a second for Spike's meaning to sink in, but when it did the brunette walked off in disgust. This was it. This was all there was. He'd disappeared for ten years. Come back. Made both him and Buffy accomplice to murder, and now he was just going to leave without even giving Buffy as little of an explanation as he'd given him.

Spike pulled some ice from a bucket that rested on the bar, dropping it into a handkerchief so that he could hold it against his split lip. With a last effort at civility he stumbled from the room. "Take care of yourself, Scott. Thanks for the pen."

Scott looked up from his whisky glass. "Yeah, sure, no problem."

~+~

Spike lay on top of his hotel bed, propped up against the headboard. He flicked through the channels, feeling like he was in the video for The Wall except now there were even more channels of shit to choose from. After about twenty, he gave up on finding anything and pulled his mobile headset from into place, pressing speed dial with one hand and flicking channels with the other. A recorded message came over the line.

~+~

Willow Rosenberg lay cuddled up in a warm cosy bed with her significant other. She stirred as the phone rang, trying to shake the sleep from her system in case one of her patients was having some sort of crisis. She stretched, listening to the recorded message and waiting to see who the caller was.

A flat monotone voice followed hers. "Doctor Rosenberg, it's Spike Blank. Listen, I just wanted to tell you that I won't be coming round any more." A look of annoyance settled on the redhead's face, and she crawled out of bed. "Things are going really well here. Everything's worked out better than I thought, and I don't think our little chats are really helping." Willow picked up the cordless handset and headed to the en suite bathroom as the voice droned on. "I don't think you really take our sessions seriously, and I want you to take a deep breath and realise-" The rest of Spike's message was lost as the handset settled to the bottom of the lavatory cistern. Replacing the heavy porcelain lid, Willow smiled smugly to herself, pleased that she'd stood up to Spike's bullying tactics and toddled back to bed.

~+~

"I want you to realise... that this.. is.. me.. firing.. you." Spike drew out the phrase, enunciating every word before he pulled off the headset, which would have broken the connection if it hadn't already been broken.

The knock at his room door made him reach for his gun, and he crept to the door in case another killer waited on the other side, just hoping for the smallest noise to let them know where to shoot. He pulled the door open the smallest amount that would actually let him see who was there, holding the gun at waist level, ready to shoot if need be. Instead he found himself pointing the weapon at Buffy.

She looked hunched up and miserable, her arms wrapped around her as if for warmth, even though the weather wasn't cold. Spike pulled the door wide, ushering her in and dropping the gun into his jacket pocket. She looked at his battered face up close for the first time. Her question came out as a whisper. "He was going to kill you, right?"

"Yes."

"It wasn't the other way round?"

"No. No. I didn't want that to happen."

"I-is it something you've done?"

Spike took a breath, and then another before he answered. "It's something I do... professionally. For about five years now." He used his sleeve to gently wipe a tear from Buffy's cheek as he spoke.

As he finished, Buffy's mouth fell open with a gasp as she put the pieces of the puzzle together. "But you were joking. People joke about the horrible things that they don't do." She backed away from him into the middle of the room her hands held out in front of her to stop him closing the distance between them. "They don't do them. It's- it's- You-"

"When I left I joined the army, and when I took the service exam... my psych profile fit a certain... moral flexibility. I was loaned out to a CIA sponsored program, and we sort of found each other. That's the way it works." Spike bent his head this way and that as he spoke trying to keep eye contact even when Buffy dropped her gaze. It made him look a bit like a small dog trying to look endearing."

"So you- you're a government spook?"

"Yeah, I mean no, not any more. Thing is, I kinda realised all that's just irrelevant really. I mean when you talk about nations, governments, it's all just public relations, really."

"Don't. Just don't." Buffy cut off Spike's rambling. "Don't start rationalising and theorising. Just tell me about the dead people. Explain the dead people." She didn't look hurt any more. She looked betrayed, betrayed and pissed.

"Well, it's kinda complicated. In the beginning, you need a reason, some sort of principle that you believe in. With me it was maintaining unchecked aggression. Other guys were into live free or die, but you get the idea... 

But what happens eventually is that you realise that all that is, is a line they feed you to make you willing to do what they want. But by then you're not just willing to do it, you're trained to do it, and you want to do it. You get to like it." Spike tried to backpedal when he saw the look of horror on Buffy's face.

"I know that sounds bad-"

"Yeah. You're a psychopath..." Buffy backed away almost as far as the room window.

"No. No." Spike sputtered knowing he was losing her. "A psychopath kills for no reason. I kill for money. It's a job- That doesn't sound right... Let me put it another way... If I turn up at your door, chances are you did something to bring me there. You should see the files on some of these wankers, pet. They read like a demon's resumé.

Look, love, I... I can't do it any more. I've lost my taste for it, completely. That's why I came back, you know. I wanted to see you. Start over, leave all that behind."

"Oh, so I'm part of-" Buffy gave a hiccup that in her near hysterical state could have been either a sob or a laugh. "I'm part of your romantic new beginning. Right?" She advanced on Spike, the hostility in her voice causing him to give ground before her. He opened his mouth to reply, but she cut him off before he could. "How come you never learned that it was wrong? That there are some things you do not do- You just do not do in a civilised society."

"Actually-"

"Shut up. Just shut up. Everything about you is a lie. Everything. You're the one with the demon's resumé. Stay away from me." Buffy stormed around him and headed for the door.

Spike lunged after her. "Buffy, don't go!"

"Don't you get it Spike?" Buffy turned to face him, her eyes full of fury, as she held the door open. "You don't get to have me. There are some things that are just too big to be forgiven." 

All Spike could do was watch as she slammed the door behind her on the way out.

****

Feedback: Craved in a manner that's most unbecoming Tales@he-s-no-angel.net 


	16. Chapter 17

Disclaimer: Spike, Buffy and all the other members of the Sunnydale crowd belong to Joss Whedon, UPN, Fox, and so on, and so on. Grosse Point Blank was written by Tom Jankiewicz, D V deVincentis, S K Boatman & the vastly talented John Cusack. It is of course owned by Hollywood pictures and Caravan Pictures and not me. I'm ripping them both off for no profit whatsoever, other than the happies I may get when and if you lovely people review.

Note: Flashbacks are shown in italics 

Chapter 17

Cordy reckoned this was the best time she'd ever had in a morning's work. She sang a tuneless version of a song that no-one else would have recognised as "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" as she sloshed kerosene all around the office. When the second can was empty, she picked up a large hammer and tipping over the pc's tower unit, she began to thump away. Papers from the antique filing cabinets lay sprawled in accelerant soaked heaps on the floor. Anything that could possibly tell anyone that the so-called shipping firm was anything other than what it seemed was ready to go up with a nice big whoosh, preferably after it was smashed to smithereens. In the midst of this delinquent's playtime, the phone rang.

"Are we out of business yet?" Spike asked.

Cordy didn't even stop her destruction to answer, just the singing. "I'm closing up the office, as we speak," she replied into her headset as she tossed the pc unit across the room.

"Good. I'll put things right, and then I'll find you."

Cordy's voice was laced with suspicion as she asked, "Why?"

Spike sighed. "It's not like that, Cordy. Look under your desk. I left a little something for you... Right under." Cordy felt around on the underside of the huge desk.

"You couldn't have told me this before I doused the carpet all the way round the desk with kerosene?"

"No, you stupid bint, I waited specially. "

Cordy pulled out a parcel roughly the size of two house bricks. Pulling away the parcel tape that had held the bundle to the bottom of the desk, she found herself staring into the plastic-wrapped face of a dead president, Benjamin Franklin if memory served, lots of Benjamin Franklins.

"You shouldn't have."

"It's profit-sharing. You've earned it."

"Now all you need to do is sort out my love-life, and I will call you God."

"Actually, if you make it back to your California roots, I probably could set you up with someone. Independent business man, but he still keeps his hand in on the physical side of things..."

"Porsche?"

"Audi TT."

"I could settle," Cordy said with a playful lilt to her voice.

Spike gave a snort of amusement. "Bye, pet. I'll be in touch."

He pulled off the phone headset. The harsh light of day didn't make Spike's situation look any better than it had done the night before. A shower and a change of clothes, back to the jeans and duster had helped a bit though. He picked up the familiar cling-film covered parcel in front of him, peeling back the layers of wrapping till he got down to the red wallet. He pulled the top sheet up, knowing it would have the key to his target's identity. He read the name, and then sat there with the parcel in his hands, stupefied by the ludicrous twist of fate. "Bugger it all to hell an' back." Picking up the file, he grabbed his gun case and started to jog to his car.

The jogger came into sight over the brow of the hill. As he did, the rifle's crosshairs trained first on his head and then on his heart. Angelus leant back from his position in the front passenger seat to instruct the man with the rifle, who was taking aim through the open side door of the large, white van.

"Wait a while, Dalton. You can't get a sure kill with a single shot at this distance, and if the old fart falls over, he'll make a bastard of a target. Never mind the fact that if he dies of a coronary, the tight fuckers'll try an' welch on payin' you."

Just as he finished speaking, Spike's Town Car crested the rise, slewing almost immediately into a handbrake turn that left him parked across the road, with the body of the car blocking Dalton's shot. Giles watched with a bemused expression as Spike leaned over and flung open the passenger door.

"Yes, Spike. Was there something that you wanted?"

"For Christ sake! Get in the bloody car, quick! And keep your head down." 

As soon as Giles got in the car, Spike hit the accelerator and took off away from the point where the van was waiting. He took a zig-zag route to the house on Revello drive instead of the more direct one that would have taken Giles within fifty yards of the gunman. Unsure whether Spike would return to the house, or take Giles somewhere else until it was time for his court appearance, Angelus had no alternative but to follow him.

Spike reached through the gap between the two front seats, pulling out the red file and tipped it into Giles' lap, photographs and documents spreading everywhere. Giles pulled out a handful of sheets at random.

"Good Lord! They've got my whole life in here."

"Hopefully not," Spike responded.

"What exactly is going on here, William?"

"Well, I was hired to kill you." Spike glanced apprehensively over at the older man, knowing that in a brawl, especially when his opponent was distracted by, say, driving a car for example, Rupert was more than capable of holding his own. "But I'm not going to. Don't ask me why."

"Why?"

"It's my job. I seem to remember I told you that already. At the time you gave the impression you approved, as I recall."

"I did? I guess I wasn't really listening. Sometimes I find it's better not to hear what you young people say."

"God, Giles I knew about the glasses. I didn't realise you had selective deafness as well."

Giles continued to sift through the papers in his lap. "Why not?"

"Why not what- Oh. Look. I don't know. It's either because I'm in love with your daughter... or I have a new found respect for life.. or both. I'm not sure."

Behind them the white van followed as fast as it could, but the Lincoln seemed to handle better on the turns, and Spike knew where he was going, whilst the van's driver had to try to react. Angelus watched the car in front as if he could will the distance in between to disappear.

"That punk is either in love with that guy's daughter... or he has a new found respect for life."

The van's driver looked over at Angelus. "FYI sweet cheeks, no-one says punk any more. That went out with platforms and Dirty Harry movies, and it's only the platforms that came back."

"Coming from someone who dresses like he stole his wardrobe from the cast of guys and dolls, I think that's a bit rich." Angelus voice almost became a whine. "And he is a punk, literally. You should have seen him when I met him. Billy Idol wanna-be..." Turning in his seat, he swallowed something he'd taken from a tub in his pocket. Holding out the lidless tub toward the two men in the back, he offered to the men seated behind him, "Durazac?"

Giles stopped sifting and stared at the piece of paper currently at the top of the stack.

"A strip mall. Someone wants me dead, so that they can build a strip mall on our dig site."

Spike shrugged. "It's economics, Rupes. It cheaper to pay someone to kill you. Then, if no-one else gets all the paperwork in soon enough to stop them, they can put up the mall right where they first intended, rather than find a new site and start from scratch."

"You were going to kill me just so a gaggle of women can buy even more shoes that they'll wear once and then keep for special occasions until they can't wear them any more because they're last season's."

"It's not me! Why does everybody think it's personal?" Spike swung the steering wheel sharply and hit the brakes, swinging them around the side of the house and into an area directly adjacent to the back porch that was never intended for vehicular traffic. 

Giles fixed Spike with a disapproving stare as the younger man turned to grab his case from the back seat. "Joyce is going to kill you when she sees the state of her roses."

"Not if you're still around for her to see the state of, she won't." Spike rebutted. "Now move, they're not far behind us." Spike made a dash for the back door carrying the case full of guns and knives.

Spike pushed Giles through the back door and into the kitchen. Buffy looked up from her bowl of cereal, saw Spike, and then looked back down at her yummy sushi pyjamas. "Giles, what's he doing here? He's not welcome. Kick his butt out of here."

Giles sighed and looked from Buffy to Spike, who was currently unloading large portions of his case out onto the kitchen island. "There are some people trying to kill me. Spike just saved my life. Now can the pair of you be civil, or do we have to pretend you're both fifteen again?"

Buffy gave a disbelieving snort as Spike ushered her and Giles into a corner of the dining room where they were protected by a brick wall rather than wood and were out of sight from the front of the house. Spike pulled back the slider on a Desert Eagle pistol and handed it to Buffy, before he headed back to the kitchen island grabbing a pair of 9mm pistols for himself and talking as he made his way through the living room to the hall.

"So... prom night, I'm sitting there in this bloody nancy-boy rented tux. I've got a corsage in one hand and a bottle of champagne, that you'd probably have told me you were too young to drink, in the other." Spike heard Giles snort of amusement at how wary Buffy had once been of alcohol. "So I just sit there, and suddenly I can see the whole night. It just flashes before my eyes. And then, suddenly, it's not a prom dress you're wearing. It's a wedding dress, and it's my whole life that's flashing in front of my eyes... And that was when I realised. For the first time in my life I really wanted to kill someone. So I figured, since I loved you so much, that it'd be a good idea if I didn't see you any more."

Buffy could tell by Spike's voice that he'd moved into the hall and she started to move forward, determined to give him back his gun. Just then, two shots rang out at the front of the house, and Spike took off for the kitchen again. In the dining room, Buffy and Giles shifted far enough to see the two tennis ball sized holes that Spike's shots had put through the front door. Buffy pointed in the direction of the kitchen to indicate Spike, and then made a twirling motion to one side of her head to indicate what she thought of his mental state. Then she pointed back and forward between her and Giles and then at the front door. Giles nodded, and the pair made a break for it. Buffy pulled the front door wide, ready for a quick getaway, only to see the gun-toting corpse that decorated the front porch, and Angelus running down the path toward her. She slammed it shut again, running back to the spot where Spike had originally left her. Giles followed close behind.

The station wagon turned onto the suburban street just in time for the spooks to see the white van screech to a halt in front of 1630 Revello Drive. Angelus, Dalton and another gunman jumped out of the van almost as soon as it stopped, passing out of their line of sight. A few seconds later, Angelus ran back to the vehicle and seemed to be waving his weapon at the vehicle's driver. Forrest pointed to a narrow turn off between them and the house. "Take the back lane we'll come up on them from behind."

"No way, dumpling. I don't do guns."

"Why don't you just pick up a gun, and get your arse in the house, before I stick a bullet in it."

Lorne tutted at him. "And waste ammo you might need for Blondie? I don't think so. You said everybody had to join the union, so I joined. You hired me to drive, so I drove-"

"Almost. Remind me to stay out of whatever state gave you a licence," interjected Angelus.

"Semantics. But I don't do guns. And I most especially don't do the other end of a gun from cup-cake in there. So, if you want someone poisoned, or you make it out of there, your chauffeur will be waiting, but until then, have fun without me."

Angelus gave a grunt of disgust and set off at a run toward the house. The front door miraculously opened to show his target standing just behind his step daughter. He opened fire with both the handguns he was carrying, just as the door slammed shut again. He blew several holes through the door, but it still provided a miraculously solid barrier, preventing his entry. He decided to see if Dalton had had better luck at the side of the building.

Dalton's shot shattered the glass in the upper half of the back door into smithereens and sent Spike ducking for cover behind the island. As soon as he was mostly in cover, his left hand came up over the unit, firing four shots blind in the general direction of the doorway. Dalton's body fell forward. His upper body hung in the kitchen. His lower half was still standing on the porch. Spike cautiously looked around the side of the island. As soon as he saw Dalton's body, he dashed back to where he had left Buffy and Giles and began to usher them through the hall and upstairs ahead of him.

"The bathroom. The tub's cast iron. Get in there, lock both the doors and lie down in the tub."

As he made his way up the last flight of stairs, Angelus' barrage of shots came through the front door. Spike turned and crouched. Then, taking aim between the balusters, he loosed several shots in the area of the front door. When it seemed that no further attack was coming from that direction, Spike continued on up to the top landing, where he made sure he had a clear line of fire on anyone who tried to come up the stairs and started swapping the partially used clips in his guns for fresh ones he had in his duster pockets.

As he worked he called out so that Buffy would be able to hear him. "I love you, Buffy... I know we can make this work... Back then I was afraid to commit to a relationship... I mean eighteen's no age to be settling down... But there was never anyone else, and I know I'm ready now to make it happen. I know what I do isn't, well moral per se, but it's over now, and if you can just look past that, then you'd see a man worth loving."

Angelus voice echoed up from downstairs. "Don't listen to him. He's a professional. It's in his blood. He'll never give up... " 

Spike knocked quietly as he could on the bathroom door. After some whispered words between himself and Giles, the door opened a few inches briefly and then closed again. Abandoning the stairs, Spike made his way to Buffy's room. It only took him seconds to open the window and get down to the ground using the familiar tree. As he paused cautiously, debating whether to use Giles' front door key to let himself back into the house, he could hear Angelus' voice coming from the dining room. Choosing caution, he darted round to the side of the house, entering through the kitchen.

"What's up, Spike? Does your girlfriend not want to listen to your pathetic serenade? Doesn't she believe that the Big Bad's retired?"

Spike couldn't see anything from his view point and started sneaking through the living room, while Angelus hearing movement in the other end of the house, made for the kitchen. Spike had almost come full circle through the downstairs of the house, when the back door (now minus Dalton's body) was kicked in. "National Secur-" Spike turned to where Graham Miller and Forrest Gates were framed in the doorway and started firing with both guns. A double stream of bullets also came from the kitchen just to one side of the serving hatch, telling him where Angelus was. 

Spike moved as he fired. He wanted to be sure that once the NSA agents were taken down he would be able to step into cover at the side of the serving hatch, so that his position effectively mirrored Angelus' with the counter between them. Miller's body must have had about thirty rounds in it from the four automatic pistols before it began to drop and sag enough that the shots began to hit Forrest. It only took slightly over a second from the abortive warning shout till the second agent hit the floor. 

Spike turned toward Angelus and shot even as he saw the larger man's guns pivot toward him. He blessed his lucky stars that both guns were empty, the sliders jammed in the back position. Spike waited for the recoil to jar his wrists. When it didn't, he realised that Angelus' guns weren't the only ones with no ammunition.

"What d'ya know. Both empty," Angelus quipped.

Angelus ducked down behind the serving hatch, and Spike sidestepped into the cover the wall. As he did so, he noticed the cumbersome old TV that had once adorned the living room, but had obviously been relegated to the seldom used dining room when it was replaced with a sleeker model.

"So Spike, You out?"

"Maybe," Spike hedged testing the weight of the old set. "You?"

"I'm fine... How about I sell you a piece for a hundred grand?" Angelus asked from his spot behind the counter.

"Front me?" Spike asked as he moved back to his original position with the TV in his arms.

"Okay."

A gun arced its way over the counter too near the middle for Spike to have been able to catch it, even if he wasn't holding the TV set. From the position of the slider, Spike noted that it was empty. As the gun clattered to the dining room floor, Angelus began to rise up from his position behind the counter with a fresh gun in each hand. As his head popped up, Spike brought the TV down, screen first. Angelus fell over in the middle of the kitchen; his head encased by the mock wood of the TV's sides. As Spike peered over the counter, his leg twitched slightly, and a blue flicker of electricity sparked near his head. Jerking the cable from the wall, on the grounds that Joyce would never forgive him if he burnt the house down, Spike began to make his weary way upstairs.

His face still sported several cuts, and his left eye had turned black and blue overnight. His hands were dripping with blood from the splinters of glass that found their way there when he smashed the TV, but none of that mattered because he was the last man standing. He stood to one side as he knocked on the bathroom door and was pleased that he did when two holes larger than his fist suddenly appeared in it.

"Buffy, it's me, Spike. They're gone. Well not gone, but... You can come out." 

When no-one answered, Spike reached through one of the holes, undoing the bolt that held the door shut. "Buffy, I know I'm not a good man." Spike pushed the door open to see Buffy and Giles spooned together in the somewhat cramped bathtub. "...But I think I can be a good husband. Buffy, will you marry me?" Buffy looked up at him with a look that conveyed sheer exhaustion, but Giles piped up in a somewhat dry tone. "Well, I think you can have my blessing." Spike slumped to the floor.

~+~

"Okay, people of Sunnydale. It's another sunny morning, and Radio Sunnydale is here with six hours of non-stop music. Some people say forgive and forget. I say forget about forgiving and just accept, and get the hell out of town."

Spike snapped the radio off with a jerk. "I've already got to listen to you gibbering away about where you want to go next without listening to a tape of you on the wireless as well."

"Wireless. It's a radio. Where do you think you are? England? In the 1950's?"

"Not yet."

"And not till I've had at least a week shopping in Paris, either..."

****

DEDICATION

Dedicated two the memory of two souls who departed this life in December, leaving the rest of us poorer for their absence, Glen Quinn and Joe Strummer.


End file.
